Sonnet to Ocean
Shall I rebuke thee, Ocean, my old love,That once, in rage, with the wild winds at strife,Thou darest menace my unit of a life,Sending my clay below, my soul above,Whilst roar'd thy waves, like lions when they roveBy night, and bound upon their prey by stealth!Yet didst thou n'er restore my fainting health?--Didst thou ne'er murmur gently like the dove?Nay, dost thou not against my own dear shoreFull break, last link between my land and me?--My absent friends talk in thy very roar,In thy waves' beat their kindly pulse I see,And, if I must not see my England more,Next to her soil, my grave be found in thee!
Words in this poem
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- strife n.
- The act of striving; earnest endeavor. [OF. estrif. See Strive.]
- stealth n.
- The act of stealing; theft. [OE. staple. See Steal, v. t.]
- didst
- , the 2d pers. sing. imp. of Do.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sonnet to Ocean is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood, Project Gutenberg ebook #15652; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Thomas Hood, Sonnet to Ocean, in The Song of the Shirt, and Other Poems (1826–1845), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #15652, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hood-poetical-works/sonnet-to-ocean.html, id L20094.
Form and metre
Sonnet to Ocean is 14 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 ABBA-CCADEDEDE loveA · strifeB · lifeB · aboveA · rove · stealthC · healthC · doveA · shoreD · meE · roarD · seeE · moreD · theeE
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 pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Shall I rebuke thee, Ocean, my old love, | 10 | ··˘/·/˘··· |
| That once, in rage, with the wild winds at strife, | 10 | ·········· |
| Thou darest menace my unit of a life, | 11 | ···/˘·/˘··· |
| Sending my clay below, my soul above, | 10 | /˘········ |
| Whilst roar'd thy waves, like lions when they rove | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| By night, and bound upon their prey by stealth! | 10 | ·········· |
| Yet didst thou n'er restore my fainting health?-- | 10 | ····˘/·/˘· |
| Didst thou ne'er murmur gently like the dove? | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Nay, dost thou not against my own dear shore | 10 | ·········· |
| Full break, last link between my land and me?-- | 10 | ·········· |
| My absent friends talk in thy very roar, | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| In thy waves' beat their kindly pulse I see, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| And, if I must not see my England more, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Next to her soil, my grave be found in thee! | 10 | ·········· |
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.