580. The Primrose
Ask me why I send you hereThis sweet Infanta of the year?Ask me why I send to youThis primrose, thus bepearl'd with dew?I will whisper to your ears:The sweets of love are mix'd with tears.
Ask me why this flower does showSo yellow-green, and sickly too?Ask me why the stalk is weakAnd bending (yet it doth not break)?I will answer: These discoverWhat fainting hopes are in a lover.
Words in this poem
- infanta n.
- A title borne by every one of the daughters of the kings of Spain and Portugal, except the eldest. [Sp. & Pg., fem. of infante. See Infante.]
- discover v. i.
- To discover or show one's self.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
580. The Primrose is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #22421; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Robert Herrick, 580. The Primrose, in Hesperides (1648), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herrick-hesperides/580-the-primrose.html, id L05545.
Form and metre
580. The Primrose is 12 lines in 2 stanzas of 6 lines each. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.8 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 42% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 AABBCC hereA · yearA · youB · dewB · earsC · tearsC
- 2 ----AA show · too · weak · break · discoverA · loverA
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Ask me why I send you here | 7 | ······· |
| This sweet Infanta of the year? | 8 | ··˘/˘··· |
| Ask me why I send to you | 7 | ······· |
| This primrose, thus bepearl'd with dew? | 8 | ·/······ |
| I will whisper to your ears: | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| The sweets of love are mix'd with tears. | 8 | ········ |
| Ask me why this flower does show | 8 | ····/˘·· |
| So yellow-green, and sickly too? | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Ask me why the stalk is weak | 7 | ······· |
| And bending (yet it doth not break)? | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| I will answer: These discover | 8 | ··/˘·˘/˘ |
| What fainting hopes are in a lover. | 9 | ·/˘····/˘ |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.