M. Where?
C. In the churchyard, Uncle--he is gone:He passed behind the tower.
M. I heard a bell:There is a funeral, then, behind the church.
J. Amy died--Dear little Amy! when you talk of her,Say, she is gone to heaven.
1st Child. No, not so soon;But some day God will call her to come up,And then she will. Papa knows everything--He said she would before he planted her.
1st Child. Yes, Uncle, did you know? A large bright star,And at her side she had some little ones--Some young ones.
M. Young ones! no, my little maid,Those stars are very old.
Words in this poem
- churchyard n.
- The ground adjoining a church, in which the dead are buried; a cemetery.
- papa n.
- A child's word for father. [F. papa, L. papa; cf. Gr. Pope.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
M. Where? is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume I., Project Gutenberg ebook #13223; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Jean Ingelow, M. Where?, in Poems, Volume I (1863), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #13223, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/ingelow-poems/m-where.html, id L12796.
Form and metre
M. Where? is 16 lines in 6 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic tetrameter. 97% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.0 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
See other poems in iambic 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.
- 5 -AA star · onesA · onesA
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| C. In the churchyard, Uncle--he is gone: | 10 | ···/·/˘··· |
| He passed behind the tower. | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| M. I heard a bell: | 5 | ····· |
| There is a funeral, then, behind the church. | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| J. Amy died-- | 4 | ·/˘· |
| Dear little Amy! when you talk of her, | 10 | ·/˘/˘····· |
| Say, she is gone to heaven. | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| 1st Child. No, not so soon; | 6 | ······ |
| But some day God will call her to come up, | 10 | ·········· |
| And then she will. Papa knows everything-- | 10 | ····/˘·/˘· |
| He said she would before he planted her. | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| 1st Child. Yes, Uncle, did you know? A large bright star, | 12 | ···/˘······· |
| And at her side she had some little ones-- | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Some young ones. | 3 | ··· |
| M. Young ones! no, my little maid, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Those stars are very old. | 6 | ···/˘· |
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.