Guido Guinizelli: IN verity I'd sing my lady's praise
In verity I'd sing my lady's praise,With rose and lily-flower her face compare :Like to the morning star her beauty's rays,Like to a saint in heaven, ah, wond'rous fair !Green shades are like her and the breeze as well,All hues, all blossoms, flushed and pale, besideSilver and gold and rare stones' lustrous spell ;Even Love himself in her is glorified.
She goes her way so gentle and so sweet,Pride falls in whomsoever she doth meet,Worthless the heart which scorneth such delight !Ungentle folk may not endure her sight,And a still greater virtue I aver :No man thinks ill hath he but looked on her.
Words in this poem
- verity n.
- The quality or state of being true, or real; consonance of a statement, proposition, or other thing, with fact; truth; reality. [F. vérité, L. veritas, fr. verus true. See Very.]
- whomsoever pron.
- The objective of whosoever. See Whosoever.
- ungentle a.
- Not gentle; lacking good breeding or delicacy; harsh.
- folk n.
- In Anglo-Saxon times, the people of a group of townships or villages; a community; a tribe. [AS. folc; akin to D. volk, OS. & OHG. folk, G. volk, Icel. f, Sw. & Dan. folk, Lith. pulkas crowd, and perh. to E. follow.]
- aver n.
- A work horse, or working ox. [OF. aver domestic animal, whence LL. averia, pl. cattle. See Habit, and cf. Average.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Guido Guinizelli: IN verity I'd sing my lady's praise is in the public domain. This text is taken from An Anthology of Italian Poems, 13th to 19th Century, Selected & Translated by Lorna de' Lucchi, Internet Archive, the Lorna de' Lucchi 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: Various, Guido Guinizelli: IN verity I'd sing my lady's praise, in An Anthology of Italian Poems (Selections), text of Internet Archive, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/italian-anthology-de-lucchi/guido-guinizelli-in-verity-i-d-sing-my-lady-s-praise.html, id L26482.
Form and metre
Guido Guinizelli: IN verity I'd sing my lady's praise is 14 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
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 ABABCDCD praiseA · compareB · raysA · fairB · wellC · besideD · spellC · glorifiedD
- 2 AABB-- sweetA · meetA · delightB · sightB · aver · her
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 |
|---|---|---|
| In verity I'd sing my lady's praise, | 10 | ·/˘˘···/˘· |
| With rose and lily-flower her face compare : | 10 | ···/˘/··˘/ |
| Like to the morning star her beauty's rays, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Like to a saint in heaven, ah, wond'rous fair ! | 10 | ·····/·/˘· |
| Green shades are like her and the breeze as well, | 10 | ·········· |
| All hues, all blossoms, flushed and pale, beside | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| Silver and gold and rare stones' lustrous spell ; | 10 | /˘·····/˘· |
| Even Love himself in her is glorified. | 10 | /·˘/···/˘· |
| She goes her way so gentle and so sweet, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Pride falls in whomsoever she doth meet, | 10 | ····˘/˘··· |
| Worthless the heart which scorneth such delight ! | 10 | /˘···/˘·˘/ |
| Ungentle folk may not endure her sight, | 10 | ˘/˘···˘/·· |
| And a still greater virtue I aver : | 10 | ···/˘/˘·/˘ |
| No man thinks ill hath he but looked on her. | 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.