Grief
There is a hungry longing in the soul,A craving sense of emptiness and pain,She may not satisfy nor yet control,For all the teeming world looks void and vain.No compensation in eternal spheres,She knows the loneliness of all her years.
There is no comfort looking forth nor back,The present gives the lie to all her past.Will cruel time restore what she doth lack?Why was no shadow of this doom forecast?Ah! she hath played with many a keen-edged thing;Naught is too small and soft to turn and sting.
In the unnatural glory of the hour,Exalted over time, and death, and fate,No earthly task appears beyond her power,No possible endurance seemeth great.She knows her misery and her majesty,And recks not if she be to live or die.
Words in this poem
- teeming a.
- Prolific; productive.
- loneliness n.
- The condition of being lonely; solitude; seclusion.
- forecast v. t.
- To plan beforehand; to scheme; to project.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Grief is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Emma Lazarus, Volume 1, Project Gutenberg ebook #3295; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Emma Lazarus, Grief, in Poems, Volume I (1867–1887), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #3295, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/lazarus-poems/grief.html, id L01869.
Form and metre
Grief is 18 lines in 3 stanzas of 6 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABABCC, complete in 2 of its 3 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 85%). 89% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.1 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
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 ABABCC soulA · painB · controlA · vainB · spheresC · yearsC
- 2 ABABCC backA · pastB · lackA · forecastB · thingC · stingC
- 3 ABAB-- hourA · fateB · powerA · greatB · majesty · die
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 |
|---|---|---|
| There is a hungry longing in the soul, | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| A craving sense of emptiness and pain, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘˘·· |
| She may not satisfy nor yet control, | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| For all the teeming world looks void and vain. | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| No compensation in eternal spheres, | 10 | ··˘/˘·˘/˘· |
| She knows the loneliness of all her years. | 10 | ···/˘˘···· |
| There is no comfort looking forth nor back, | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| The present gives the lie to all her past. | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Will cruel time restore what she doth lack? | 10 | ·/˘·˘/···· |
| Why was no shadow of this doom forecast? | 10 | ···/····/· |
| Ah! she hath played with many a keen-edged thing; | 10 | ·····/···· |
| Naught is too small and soft to turn and sting. | 10 | ·········· |
| In the unnatural glory of the hour, | 10 | ··˘/˘/˘··/ |
| Exalted over time, and death, and fate, | 10 | ˘/˘······· |
| No earthly task appears beyond her power, | 11 | ·/˘·˘/···/˘ |
| No possible endurance seemeth great. | 10 | ·/˘˘/˘˘/˘· |
| She knows her misery and her majesty, | 11 | ···/˘˘··/˘˘ |
| And recks not if she be to live or die. | 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.