Oh, Why Not Be Happy?
Oh, why not be happy this bright summer day,'Mid perfume of roses and newly-mown hay?Great Nature is smiling--the birds in the airSing love-lays together, and all is most fair.Then why not be happyThis bright summer day,'Mid perfume of rosesAnd newly-mown hay?
The streamlets they wander through meadows so fleet,Their music enticing fond lovers to meet;The violets are blooming and nestling their headsIn richest profusion on moss-coated beds.Then why not be happyThis bright summer day,When Nature is fairestAnd all is so gay?
Words in this poem
- nestling n.
- A young bird which has not abandoned the nest. Piers Plowman.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Oh, Why Not Be Happy? is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #8775, the various hands translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Victor Hugo, Oh, Why Not Be Happy?, in Poems (1888), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #8775, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hugo-poems/oh-why-not-be-happy.html, id L26858.
Form and metre
Oh, Why Not Be Happy? is 16 lines in 2 stanzas of 8 lines each. It is in rhyming couplets, 50% of the lines. The metre is anapaestic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%).
See other poems in rhyming couplets, other poems in anapaestic 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 AABB-A-A dayA · hayA · airB · fairB · happy · dayA · roses · hayA
- 2 AABB-C-C fleetA · meetA · headsB · bedsB · happy · dayC · fairest · gayC
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 anapaestic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Oh, why not be happy this bright summer day, | 11 | ····/˘··/˘· |
| 'Mid perfume of roses and newly-mown hay? | 11 | ·˘/·/˘·/˘·· |
| Great Nature is smiling--the birds in the air | 11 | ·/˘·/˘····· |
| Sing love-lays together, and all is most fair. | 11 | ···˘/˘····· |
| Then why not be happy | 6 | ····/˘ |
| This bright summer day, | 5 | ··/˘· |
| 'Mid perfume of roses | 6 | ·˘/·/˘ |
| And newly-mown hay? | 5 | ·/˘·· |
| The streamlets they wander through meadows so fleet, | 11 | ····/˘·/··· |
| Their music enticing fond lovers to meet; | 11 | ·/˘˘/˘·/˘·· |
| The violets are blooming and nestling their heads | 11 | ·/˘·/˘·/˘·· |
| In richest profusion on moss-coated beds. | 11 | ·/˘˘/˘··/˘· |
| Then why not be happy | 6 | ····/˘ |
| This bright summer day, | 5 | ··/˘· |
| When Nature is fairest | 6 | ·/˘·/˘ |
| And all is so gay? | 5 | ····· |
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.