Thoughts: Mahomed Akram
If some day this body of mine were burned(It found no favour alas! with you)And the ashes scattered abroad, unurned,Would Love die also, would Thought die too?But who can answer, or who can trust,No dreams would harry the windblown dust?
Were I laid away in the furrows deepSecure from jackal and passing plough,Would your eyes not follow me still through sleepTorment me then as they torture now?Would you ever have loved me, Golden Eyes,Had I done aught better or otherwise?
Was I overspeechful, or did you yearnWhen I sat silent, for songs or speech?Ah, Beloved, I had been so apt to learn,So apt, had you only cared to teach.But time for silence and song is done,You wanted nothing, my Golden Sun!
What should you want of a waning star?That drifts in its lonely orbit farAway from your soft, effulgent lightIn outer planes of Eternal night?
Words in this poem
- favour n.
- Kind regard; propitious aspect; countenance; friendly disposition; kindness; good will. [Written also favour.]
- harry v. i.
- To make a predatory incursion; to plunder or lay waste.
- aught n.
- Property; possession. [AS. , fr. agan to own, p. p. ahte.]
- yearn v. t.
- To pain; to grieve; to vex. [Also earn, ern; probably a corruption of OE. ermen to grieve, AS. ierman, yrman, or geierman, geyrman, fr. earm wretched, poor; akin to D. & G. arm, Icel. armr,]
- waning n.
- The act or process of waning, or decreasing.
- effulgent a.
- Diffusing a flood of light; shining; luminous; beaming; bright; splendid. [L. effulgens, -entis, p. pr. of effulgere.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Thoughts: Mahomed Akram is in the public domain. This text is taken from India's Love Lyrics, Project Gutenberg ebook #8197; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Laurence Hope, Thoughts: Mahomed Akram, in India's Love Lyrics (1901), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #8197, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hope-india/thoughts-mahomed-akram.html, id L22592.
Form and metre
Thoughts: Mahomed Akram is 22 lines in 4 stanzas. The rhyme scheme is ABABCC, complete in 3 of its 4 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 78%).
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 ABABCC burnedA · youB · unurnedA · tooB · trustC · dustC
- 2 ABABCC deepA · ploughB · sleepA · nowB · eyesC · otherwiseC
- 3 ABABCC yearnA · speechB · learnA · teachB · doneC · sunC
- 4 AABB starA · farA · lightB · nightB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| If some day this body of mine were burned | 10 | ····/˘···· |
| (It found no favour alas! with you) | 9 | ···/˘˘/·· |
| And the ashes scattered abroad, unurned, | 10 | ··/˘/˘˘/·· |
| Would Love die also, would Thought die too? | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| But who can answer, or who can trust, | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| No dreams would harry the windblown dust? | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| Were I laid away in the furrows deep | 10 | ···˘/··/˘· |
| Secure from jackal and passing plough, | 9 | ˘/·/˘·/˘· |
| Would your eyes not follow me still through sleep | 10 | ····/˘···· |
| Torment me then as they torture now? | 9 | /·····/˘· |
| Would you ever have loved me, Golden Eyes, | 9 | ··/···/˘· |
| Had I done aught better or otherwise? | 10 | ····/˘·/˘· |
| Was I overspeechful, or did you yearn | 10 | ·········· |
| When I sat silent, for songs or speech? | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| Ah, Beloved, I had been so apt to learn, | 10 | ·˘/······· |
| So apt, had you only cared to teach. | 9 | ····/˘··· |
| But time for silence and song is done, | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| You wanted nothing, my Golden Sun! | 9 | ·/˘/˘·/˘· |
| What should you want of a waning star? | 9 | ······/˘· |
| That drifts in its lonely orbit far | 9 | ····/˘/˘· |
| Away from your soft, effulgent light | 9 | ˘/···˘/˘· |
| In outer planes of Eternal night? | 8 | ·/··˘/˘· |
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.