The Gift to Sing
Sometimes the mist overhangs my path,And blackening clouds about me cling;But, oh, I have a magic wayTo turn the gloom to cheerful day--I softly sing.
And if the way grows darker still,Shadowed by Sorrow's somber wing,With glad defiance in my throat,I pierce the darkness with a note,And sing, and sing.
I brood not over the broken past,Nor dread whatever time may bring;No nights are dark, no days are long,While in my heart there swells a song,And I can sing.
About this text
The Gift to Sing is in the public domain. This text is taken from Fifty Years, & Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #17884; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: James Weldon Johnson, The Gift to Sing, in Fifty Years and Other Poems (1917), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #17884, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/johnson-fifty-years/the-gift-to-sing.html, id L08326.
Form and metre
The Gift to Sing is 15 lines in 3 stanzas of 5 lines each. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.3 syllables. 7% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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.
- 1 -ABBA path · clingA · wayB · dayB · singA
- 2 -ABBA still · wingA · throatB · noteB · singA
- 3 -ABBA past · bringA · longB · songB · singA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Sometimes the mist overhangs my path, | 9 | /···/˘··· |
| And blackening clouds about me cling; | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| But, oh, I have a magic way | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| To turn the gloom to cheerful day-- | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| I softly sing. | 4 | ·/˘· |
| And if the way grows darker still, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Shadowed by Sorrow's somber wing, | 8 | /˘·/˘/˘· |
| With glad defiance in my throat, | 8 | ··˘/˘··· |
| I pierce the darkness with a note, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And sing, and sing. | 4 | ···· |
| I brood not over the broken past, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Nor dread whatever time may bring; | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| No nights are dark, no days are long, | 8 | ········ |
| While in my heart there swells a song, | 8 | ········ |
| And I can sing. | 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.