Ash Wednesday
Ashen cross traced on brow!Iron cross hid in breast!Have power, bring patience, now:Bid passion be at rest.
O sad, dear, days of Lent!Now lengthen your gray hours:If so we may repent,Before the time of flowers.
Majestical, austere,The sanctuaries look stern:All silent! all severe!Save where the lone lamps burn.
Imprisoned there aboveThe world's indifferency:Still waits Eternal Love,With wounds from Calvary.
Come! mourning companies;Come! to sad Christ draw near:Come! sin's confederacies;Lay down your malice here.
Here is the healing place,And here the place of peace:Sorrow is sweet with graceHere, and here sin hath cease.
Words in this poem
- ashen a.
- Of or pertaining to the ash tree. [See Ash, the tree.]
- repent a.
- Prostrate and rooting; -- said of stems. Gray. [L. repens, -entis, creeping, p. pr. of repere to creep.]
- majestical a.
- Majestic. Cowley.
- lone n.
- A lane. See Loanin.
- indifferency n.
- Absence of interest in, or influence from, anything; unconcernedness; equilibrium; indifferentism; indifference.
- calvary n.
- The place where Christ was crucified, on a small hill outside of Jerusalem. Luke xxiii. 33. [L. calvaria a bare skull, fr. calva the scalp without hair. fr. calvus bald; cf. F. calvaire.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Ash Wednesday is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #66520; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Lionel Johnson, Ash Wednesday, in Poems (1895), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #66520, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/johnson-lionel-poems/ash-wednesday.html, id L12538.
Form and metre
Ash Wednesday is 24 lines in 6 stanzas of 4 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABAB, complete in 4 of its 6 stanzas. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 85%).
See other poems in iambic trimeter.
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 ABAB browA · breastB · nowA · restB
- 2 ABAB lentA · hoursB · repentA · flowersB
- 3 ABAB austereA · sternB · severeA · burnB
- 4 A-A- aboveA · indifferency · loveA · calvary
- 5 -A-A companies · nearA · confederacies · hereA
- 6 ABAB placeA · peaceB · graceA · ceaseB
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Ashen cross traced on brow! | 6 | /˘···· |
| Iron cross hid in breast! | 6 | /˘···· |
| Have power, bring patience, now: | 6 | ·/·/˘· |
| Bid passion be at rest. | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| O sad, dear, days of Lent! | 6 | ······ |
| Now lengthen your gray hours: | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
| If so we may repent, | 6 | ····˘/ |
| Before the time of flowers. | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| Majestical, austere, | 6 | ˘/˘˘˘/ |
| The sanctuaries look stern: | 7 | ·/˘·˘·· |
| All silent! all severe! | 6 | ·/˘·˘/ |
| Save where the lone lamps burn. | 6 | ······ |
| Imprisoned there above | 6 | ˘/˘··· |
| The world's indifferency: | 7 | ··˘/˘˘˘ |
| Still waits Eternal Love, | 6 | ··˘/˘· |
| With wounds from Calvary. | 6 | ···/˘˘ |
| Come! mourning companies; | 6 | ·/˘/˘˘ |
| Come! to sad Christ draw near: | 6 | ······ |
| Come! sin's confederacies; | 7 | ··˘/˘˘˘ |
| Lay down your malice here. | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Here is the healing place, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| And here the place of peace: | 6 | ······ |
| Sorrow is sweet with grace | 6 | /˘···· |
| Here, and here sin hath cease. | 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.