A Photograph
Sweet faces, that from pictured casements leanAs from a castle window, looking downOn some gay pageant passing through a town,Yourselves the fairest figures in the scene;With what a gentle grace, with what sereneUnconsciousness ye wear the triple crownOf youth and beauty and the fair renownOf a great name, that ne'er hath tarnished been!From your soft eyes, so innocent and sweet,Four spirits, sweet and innocent as they,Gaze on the world below, the sky above;Hark! there is some one singing in the street;"Faith, Hope, and Love! these three," he seems to say;"These three; and greatest of the three is Love."
Words in this poem
- pictured a.
- Furnished with pictures; represented by a picture or pictures; as, a pictured scene.
- pageant n.
- A theatrical exhibition; a spectacle. [OE. pagent, pagen, originally, a movable scaffold or stage, hence, what was exhibited on it, fr. LL. pagina, akin to pangere to fasten; cf. L. pagina page, leaf]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
A Photograph is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Project Gutenberg ebook #1365; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, A Photograph, in The Complete Poetical Works (1839–1882), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1365, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/longfellow-poems/a-photograph.html, id L17767.
Form and metre
A Photograph is 14 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 87%). 95% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.1 syllables. 36% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 ABBAABB-CDECDE leanA · downB · townB · sceneA · sereneA · crownB · renownB · been · sweetC · theyD · aboveE · streetC · sayD · loveE
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Sweet faces, that from pictured casements lean | 11 | ·/˘··/˘···· |
| As from a castle window, looking down | 10 | ···/˘/˘/˘· |
| On some gay pageant passing through a town, | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Yourselves the fairest figures in the scene; | 10 | ˘/·/˘/˘··· |
| With what a gentle grace, with what serene | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| Unconsciousness ye wear the triple crown | 9 | ·/˘···/˘· |
| Of youth and beauty and the fair renown | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| Of a great name, that ne'er hath tarnished been! | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| From your soft eyes, so innocent and sweet, | 9 | ·····/˘·· |
| Four spirits, sweet and innocent as they, | 9 | ·/˘··/˘·· |
| Gaze on the world below, the sky above; | 10 | ·········· |
| Hark! there is some one singing in the street; | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| "Faith, Hope, and Love! these three," he seems to say; | 10 | ·········· |
| "These three; and greatest of the three is Love." | 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.