Points and Lines
Instants in the quiet, small sharp stars,Pierce my spirit with a thrust whose speedBaffles even the grasp of time.Oh that I might reflect themAs swiftly, as keenly as they shine.But I am a pool of waters, summer-still,And the stars are mirrored across me;Those stabbing points of the skyTurned to a thread of shaken silver,A long fine thread.
Words in this poem
- keenly adv.
- In a keen manner.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Points and Lines is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Defeat of Youth, and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #24364; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Aldous Huxley, Points and Lines, in The Defeat of Youth, and Other Poems (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #24364, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/huxley-defeat-of-youth/points-and-lines.html, id L22034.
Form and metre
Points and Lines is 10 lines in a single stanza. The metre is trochaic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 78%).
See other poems in trochaic 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 ------AA-- stars · speed · time · them · shine · still · meA · skyA · silver · thread
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 trochaic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Instants in the quiet, small sharp stars, | 9 | /˘··/˘··· |
| Pierce my spirit with a thrust whose speed | 9 | ··/˘····· |
| Baffles even the grasp of time. | 8 | /˘/˘···· |
| Oh that I might reflect them | 7 | ····˘/· |
| As swiftly, as keenly as they shine. | 9 | ·/˘·/˘··· |
| But I am a pool of waters, summer-still, | 11 | ······/˘/˘· |
| And the stars are mirrored across me; | 10 | ····/˘˘˘/· |
| Those stabbing points of the sky | 7 | ·/˘···· |
| Turned to a thread of shaken silver, | 10 | ·˘····/˘/˘ |
| A long fine thread. | 4 | ···· |
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.