The Poet to His Wife
To thee, all time to thee,My lyre a voice shall be!Above all earthly fashion,Above mere mundane rage,Your mind made it my passionTo write for noblest stage.
Whoe'er you be, send blessings to her--sheWas sister of my soul immortal, free!My pride, my hope, my shelter, my resource,When green hoped not to gray to run its course;She was enthronèd Virtue under heaven's dome,My idol in the shrine of curtained home.
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,]
- mundane a.
- Of or pertaining to the world; worldly; earthly; terrestrial; as, the mundane sphere. [L. mundanus, fr. mundus the world, an implement, toilet adornments, or dress; cf. mundus, a., clean, neat, Skr. mansds to adorn, dress, mansdsa adornment. Cf. M]
- resource n.
- That to which one resorts orr on which one depends for supply or support; means of overcoming a difficulty; resort; expedient. [F. ressource, fr. OF. ressourdre, resourdre, to spring forth or up again; pref. re- re- + sourdre to spring forth. See Source.]
- idol n.
- An image or representation of anything. [OE. idole, F. idole, L. idolum, fr. Gr. Wit, and cf. Eidolon.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Poet to His Wife 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, The Poet to His Wife, in Poems (1888), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #8775, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hugo-poems/the-poet-to-his-wife.html, id L26765.
Form and metre
The Poet to His Wife is 12 lines in 2 stanzas of 6 lines each. 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 AABCBC theeA · beA · fashionB · rageC · passionB · stageC
- 2 AABBCC sheA · freeA · resourceB · courseB · domeC · homeC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| To thee, all time to thee, | 6 | ······ |
| My lyre a voice shall be! | 6 | ······ |
| Above all earthly fashion, | 7 | ···/˘/˘ |
| Above mere mundane rage, | 6 | ···˘/· |
| Your mind made it my passion | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| To write for noblest stage. | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Whoe'er you be, send blessings to her--she | 9 | ····/˘··· |
| Was sister of my soul immortal, free! | 10 | ·/˘···˘/˘· |
| My pride, my hope, my shelter, my resource, | 10 | ·····/˘·/˘ |
| When green hoped not to gray to run its course; | 10 | ·········· |
| She was enthronèd Virtue under heaven's dome, | 11 | ····/˘··/˘· |
| My idol in the shrine of curtained home. | 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.