Paternal Love
My child! oh, only blessing Heaven allows me!Others have parents, brothers, kinsmen, friends,A wife, a husband, vassals, followers,Ancestors, and allies, or many children.I have but thee, thee only. Some are rich;Thou art my treasure, thou art all my riches.And some believe in angels; I believeIn nothing but thy soul. Others have youth,And woman's love, and pride, and grace, and health;Others are beautiful; thou art my beauty,Thou art my home, my country and my kin,My wife, my mother, sister, friend--my child!My bliss, my wealth, my worship, and my law,My Universe! Oh, by all other thingsMy soul is tortured. If I should ever lose thee--Horrible thought! I cannot utter it.Smile, for thy smile is like thy mother's smiling.She, too, was fair; you have a trick like her,Of passing oft your hand athwart your browAs though to clear it. Innocence still lovesA brow unclouded and an azure eye.To me thou seem'st clothed in a holy halo,My soul beholds thy soul through thy fair body;E'en when my eyes are shut, I see thee still;Thou art my daylight, and sometimes I wishThat Heaven had made me blind that thou might'st beThe sun that lighted up the world for me.
Words in this poem
- wealth n.
- Weal; welfare; prosperity; good. [OE. welthe, from wele; cf. D. weelde luxury. See Weal prosperity.]
- daylight n.
- The light of day as opposed to the darkness of night; the light of the sun, as opposed to that of the moon or to artificial light.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Paternal Love 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, Paternal Love, in Poems (1888), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #8775, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hugo-poems/paternal-love.html, id L26871.
Form and metre
Paternal Love is 27 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-------------A----------AA meA · friends · followers · children · rich · riches · believe · youth · health · beauty · kin · child · law · things · theeA · it · smiling · her · brow · loves · eye · halo · body · still · wish · beA · meA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| My child! oh, only blessing Heaven allows me! | 11 | ···/˘/˘/˘/· |
| Others have parents, brothers, kinsmen, friends, | 10 | /˘·/˘/˘··· |
| A wife, a husband, vassals, followers, | 10 | ···/˘/˘/˘˘ |
| Ancestors, and allies, or many children. | 11 | /·˘·˘/·/˘/˘ |
| I have but thee, thee only. Some are rich; | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Thou art my treasure, thou art all my riches. | 11 | ···/˘····/˘ |
| And some believe in angels; I believe | 10 | ··˘/·/˘·˘/ |
| In nothing but thy soul. Others have youth, | 10 | ·/˘···/˘·· |
| And woman's love, and pride, and grace, and health; | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Others are beautiful; thou art my beauty, | 11 | /˘·/˘˘···/˘ |
| Thou art my home, my country and my kin, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| My wife, my mother, sister, friend--my child! | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| My bliss, my wealth, my worship, and my law, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| My Universe! Oh, by all other things | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| My soul is tortured. If I should ever lose thee-- | 11 | ···/˘···/·· |
| Horrible thought! I cannot utter it. | 10 | /˘˘··/˘/˘· |
| Smile, for thy smile is like thy mother's smiling. | 11 | ·······/˘/˘ |
| She, too, was fair; you have a trick like her, | 10 | ·········· |
| Of passing oft your hand athwart your brow | 10 | ·/˘···˘/·· |
| As though to clear it. Innocence still loves | 10 | ·····/˘˘·· |
| A brow unclouded and an azure eye. | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| To me thou seem'st clothed in a holy halo, | 11 | ·······/˘/˘ |
| My soul beholds thy soul through thy fair body; | 11 | ··˘/·····/˘ |
| E'en when my eyes are shut, I see thee still; | 10 | ·········· |
| Thou art my daylight, and sometimes I wish | 10 | ···/··˘/·· |
| That Heaven had made me blind that thou might'st be | 10 | ·/········ |
| The sun that lighted up the world for me. | 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.