To Wordsworth
Look how the lark soars upward and is gone,Turning a spirit as he nears the sky!His voice is heard, but body there is noneTo fix the vague excursions of the eye.So, poets' songs are with us, tho' they dieObscured, and hid by death's oblivious shroud,And Earth inherits the rich melodyLike raining music from the morning cloud.Yet, few there be who pipe so sweet and loudTheir voices reach us through the lapse of space:The noisy day is deafen'd by a crowdOf undistinguished birds, a twittering race;But only lark and nightingale forlornFill up the silences of night and morn.
Words in this poem
- oblivious a.
- Promoting oblivion; causing forgetfulness. [L.obliviosus: cf.F. oblivieux.]
- twittering n.
- The act of one who, or that which, twitters.
- forlorn a.
- Deserted abandoned; lost. [OE., p.p. of forlesen to lose utterly, AS. forleósan (p.p. forloren); pref. for- + leósan (in comp.) to lose; cf. D. verliezen to lose, G. verlieren, Sw. förlor]
- morn n.
- The first part of the day; the morning; -- used chiefly in poetry. [OE. morwen, morgen, AS. morgen; akin to D. morgen, OS. morgan, G. morgen, Icel. morginn, morgunn, Sw. morgon, Dan. morgen, Goth. maúrgins. Cf. Morrow, Morning.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
To Wordsworth 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, To Wordsworth, 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/to-wordsworth.html, id L20069.
Form and metre
To Wordsworth is 14 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 87%).
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 -A-AAB-BBCBCDD gone · skyA · none · eyeA · dieA · shroudB · melody · cloudB · loudB · spaceC · crowdB · raceC · forlornD · mornD
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Look how the lark soars upward and is gone, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Turning a spirit as he nears the sky! | 10 | /˘·/˘····· |
| His voice is heard, but body there is none | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| To fix the vague excursions of the eye. | 10 | ····˘/˘··· |
| So, poets' songs are with us, tho' they die | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Obscured, and hid by death's oblivious shroud, | 10 | ˘/····˘/˘· |
| And Earth inherits the rich melody | 10 | ··˘/˘··/˘˘ |
| Like raining music from the morning cloud. | 10 | ·/˘/˘··/˘· |
| Yet, few there be who pipe so sweet and loud | 10 | ·········· |
| Their voices reach us through the lapse of space: | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| The noisy day is deafen'd by a crowd | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Of undistinguished birds, a twittering race; | 11 | ··˘/˘··/˘˘· |
| But only lark and nightingale forlorn | 10 | ·/˘··/˘˘˘/ |
| Fill up the silences of night and morn. | 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.