The Coastwise Lights
Our brows are bound with spindrift and the weed is on our knees;Our loins are battered 'neath us by the swinging, smoking seas.From reef and rock and skerry -- over headland, ness, and voe --The Coastwise Lights of England watch the ships of England go!
Through the endless summer evenings, on the lineless, level floors;Through the yelling Channel tempest when the siren hoots and roars --By day the dipping house-flag and by night the rocket's trail --As the sheep that graze behind us so we know them where they hail.
We bridge across the dark and bid the helmsman have a care,The flash that wheeling inland wakes his sleeping wife to prayer;From our vexed eyries, head to gale, we bind in burning chainsThe lover from the sea-rim drawn -- his love in English lanes.
We greet the clippers wing-and-wing that race the Southern wool;We warn the crawling cargo-tanks of Bremen, Leith, and Hull;To each and all our equal lamp at peril of the sea --The white wall-sided war-ships or the whalers of Dundee!
Come up, come in from Eastward, from the guardports of the Morn!Beat up, beat in from Southerly, O gipsies of the Horn!Swift shuttles of an Empire's loom that weave us, main to main,The Coastwise Lights of England give you welcome back again!
Go, get you gone up-Channel with the sea-crust on your plates;Go, get you into London with the burden of your freights!Haste, for they talk of Empire there, and say, if any seek,The Lights of England sent you and by silence shall ye speak!
Words in this poem
- skerry n.
- A rocky isle; an insulated rock. [Of Scand. origin; cf. Icel. sker, Sw. skär, Dan. ski. Cf. Scar a bank.]
- coastwise adv.
- By way of, or along, the coast.
- wheeling n.
- The act of conveying anything, or traveling, on wheels, or in a wheeled vehicle.
- morn n.
- The first part of the day; the morning; -- used chiefly in poetry. [OE. morwen, morgen, AS. morgen; akin to D. morgen, OS. morgan, G. morgen, Icel. morginn, morgunn, Sw. morgon, Dan. morgen, Goth. maúrgins. Cf. Morrow, Morning.]
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Coastwise Lights is in the public domain. This text is taken from Verses 1889-1896, Project Gutenberg ebook #323; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Rudyard Kipling, The Coastwise Lights, in Verses 1889–1896 (1889–1896), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #323, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/kipling-verses/the-coastwise-lights.html, id L16786.
Form and metre
The Coastwise Lights is 24 lines in 6 stanzas of 4 lines each. The rhyme scheme is AABB, complete in 4 of its 6 stanzas. The metre is iambic heptameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%). 93% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 14.0 syllables.
See other poems in iambic heptameter.
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 AABB kneesA · seasA · voeB · goB
- 2 AABB floorsA · roarsA · trailB · hailB
- 3 AABB careA · prayerA · chainsB · lanesB
- 4 --AA wool · hull · seaA · dundeeA
- 5 AABB mornA · hornA · mainB · againB
- 6 --AA plates · freights · seekA · speakA
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 heptameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Our brows are bound with spindrift and the weed is on our knees; | 14 | /····/˘·····/· |
| Our loins are battered 'neath us by the swinging, smoking seas. | 14 | /··/˘····/˘/˘· |
| From reef and rock and skerry -- over headland, ness, and voe -- | 13 | ·····/˘·/˘··· |
| The Coastwise Lights of England watch the ships of England go! | 14 | ·····/˘····/˘· |
| Through the endless summer evenings, on the lineless, level floors; | 16 | ··/˘/˘/˘·····/˘· |
| Through the yelling Channel tempest when the siren hoots and roars -- | 15 | ··/˘/˘/˘··/˘··· |
| By day the dipping house-flag and by night the rocket's trail -- | 14 | ···/˘······/˘· |
| As the sheep that graze behind us so we know them where they hail. | 15 | ··············· |
| We bridge across the dark and bid the helmsman have a care, | 14 | ··˘/·····/···· |
| The flash that wheeling inland wakes his sleeping wife to prayer; | 14 | ···/˘/···/˘··· |
| From our vexed eyries, head to gale, we bind in burning chains | 14 | ·/·/˘······/˘· |
| The lover from the sea-rim drawn -- his love in English lanes. | 14 | ·/˘········/˘· |
| We greet the clippers wing-and-wing that race the Southern wool; | 14 | ···/˘······/˘· |
| We warn the crawling cargo-tanks of Bremen, Leith, and Hull; | 14 | ···/˘/···/˘··· |
| To each and all our equal lamp at peril of the sea -- | 14 | ····//˘··/˘··· |
| The white wall-sided war-ships or the whalers of Dundee! | 14 | ···/˘····/˘·˘/ |
| Come up, come in from Eastward, from the guardports of the Morn! | 14 | ·····/˘······· |
| Beat up, beat in from Southerly, O gipsies of the Horn! | 12 | ·····/˘····· |
| Swift shuttles of an Empire's loom that weave us, main to main, | 14 | ·/˘··/˘······· |
| The Coastwise Lights of England give you welcome back again! | 14 | ·····/˘··/˘·˘/ |
| Go, get you gone up-Channel with the sea-crust on your plates; | 14 | ·····/˘······· |
| Go, get you into London with the burden of your freights! | 14 | ·····/˘··/˘··· |
| Haste, for they talk of Empire there, and say, if any seek, | 14 | ·····/˘····/˘· |
| The Lights of England sent you and by silence shall ye speak! | 14 | ···/˘····/˘··· |
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.