Elegiac
Dark is the morning with mist; in the narrow mouth of the harborMotionless lies the sea, under its curtain of cloud;Dreamily glimmer the sails of ships on the distant horizon,Like to the towers of a town, built on the verge of the sea.
Slowly and stately and still, they sail forth into the ocean;With them sail my thoughts over the limitless deep,Farther and farther away, borne on by unsatisfied longings,Unto Hesperian isles, unto Ausonian shores.
Now they have vanished away, have disappeared in the ocean;Sunk are the towers of the town into the depths of the sea!AU have vanished but those that, moored in the neighboringroadstead,Sailless at anchor ride, looming so large in the mist.
Vanished, too, are the thoughts, the dim, unsatisfied longings;Sunk are the turrets of cloud into the ocean of dreams;While in a haven of rest my heart is riding at anchor,Held by the chains of love, held by the anchors of trust!
Words in this poem
- dreamily adv.
- As if in a dream; softly; slowly; languidly.
- limitless a.
- Having no limits; unbounded; boundless. Davies (Wit's Pilgr.).
- hesperian a.
- Western; being in the west; occidental. [L. hesperius, fr. hesperus the evening star, Gr. Vesper.]
- roadstead n.
- An anchorage off shore. Same as Road, 4. [Road,4 + stead a place.]
- sailless a.
- Destitute of sails. Pollok.
- looming n.
- The indistinct and magnified appearance of objects seen in particular states of the atmosphere. See Mirage.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Elegiac 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, Elegiac, in The Complete Poetical Works (1839–1882), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1365, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/longfellow-poems/elegiac.html, id L17804.
Form and metre
Elegiac is 17 lines in 4 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. The metre is dactylic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 75%). 76% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 13.1 syllables. 7 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 12% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in dactylic 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.
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 dactylic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Dark is the morning with mist; in the narrow mouth of the harbor | 16 | ···/˘····/˘···/˘ |
| Motionless lies the sea, under its curtain of cloud; | 12 | /˘······/˘·· |
| Dreamily glimmer the sails of ships on the distant horizon, | 16 | /˘˘/˘······/˘˘/˘ |
| Like to the towers of a town, built on the verge of the sea. | 14 | ···/·········· |
| Slowly and stately and still, they sail forth into the ocean; | 14 | /˘·/˘········/ |
| With them sail my thoughts over the limitless deep, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Farther and farther away, borne on by unsatisfied longings, | 16 | /˘·/˘˘/···˘/˘·/˘ |
| Unto Hesperian isles, unto Ausonian shores. | 14 | ··˘/˘˘···˘/˘˘· |
| Now they have vanished away, have disappeared in the ocean; | 14 | ···/˘˘/··˘/··/ |
| Sunk are the towers of the town into the depths of the sea! | 14 | ···/·········· |
| AU have vanished but those that, moored in the neighboring | 12 | ··/˘······/˘ |
| roadstead, | 2 | /˘ |
| Sailless at anchor ride, looming so large in the mist. | 13 | /˘·/˘·/˘····· |
| Vanished, too, are the thoughts, the dim, unsatisfied longings; | 14 | /˘······˘/˘·/˘ |
| Sunk are the turrets of cloud into the ocean of dreams; | 13 | ···/˘·····/·· |
| While in a haven of rest my heart is riding at anchor, | 15 | ···/˘·····/˘·/˘ |
| Held by the chains of love, held by the anchors of trust! | 13 | ·········/˘·· |
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.