The Sacred Trinity
Three folds of the cloth, yet one only napkin is there,Three joints in the finger, but still only one finger fair;Three leaves of the shamrock, yet no more than one shamrock to wear.Frost, snow-flakes and ice, all in water their origin share,Three Persons in God; to one God alone we make prayer.
Words in this poem
- napkin n.
- A little towel, or small cloth, esp. one for wiping the fingers and mouth at table. [Dim. of OF. nape a tablecloth, cloth, F. nappe, L. mappa. See Napery.]
- shamrock n.
- A trifoliate plant used as a national emblem by the Irish. The legend is that St. Patrick once plucked a leaf of it for use in illustrating the doctrine of the trinity. [L. seamrog, seamar, trefoil, white clover, white honeysuckle; akin to Gael. seamrag.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Sacred Trinity is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poem-Book of the Gael Translations from Irish Gaelic Poetry into English Prose and Verse, Project Gutenberg ebook #46917; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Eleanor Hull, The Sacred Trinity, in The Poem-Book of the Gael (1912), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #46917, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hull-gael/the-sacred-trinity.html, id L11742.
Form and metre
The Sacred Trinity is 5 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 80% of the lines. The lines average 13.6 syllables.
See other poems in rhyming couplets.
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 AAAAA thereA · fairA · wearA · shareA · prayerA
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Three folds of the cloth, yet one only napkin is there, | 13 | ·······/˘/˘·· |
| Three joints in the finger, but still only one finger fair; | 14 | ····/˘··/˘·/˘· |
| Three leaves of the shamrock, yet no more than one shamrock to wear. | 15 | ····/······/··· |
| Frost, snow-flakes and ice, all in water their origin share, | 13 | ·······/˘·/˘· |
| Three Persons in God; to one God alone we make prayer. | 13 | ·/˘·····˘/··· |
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.