Snow-Flakes
Out of the bosom of the Air,Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken,Over the woodlands brown and bare,Over the harvest-fields forsaken,Silent, and soft, and slowDescends the snow.
Even as our cloudy fancies takeSuddenly shape in some divine expression,Even as the troubled heart doth makeIn the white countenance confession,The troubled sky revealsThe grief it feels.
This is the poem of the air,Slowly in silent syllables recorded;This is the secret of despair,Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded,Now whispered and revealedTo wood and field.
About this text
Snow-Flakes 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, Snow-Flakes, in The Complete Poetical Works (1839–1882), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1365, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/longfellow-poems/snow-flakes.html, id L17640.
Form and metre
Snow-Flakes is 18 lines in 3 stanzas of 6 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABABCC. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic tetrameter. 94% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.9 syllables. 6 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 28% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic tetrameter.
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 airA · shakenB · bareA · forsakenB · slowC · snowC
- 2 ABABCC takeA · expressionB · makeA · confessionB · revealsC · feelsC
- 3 ABABCC airA · recordedB · despairA · hoardedB · revealedC · fieldC
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Out of the bosom of the Air, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken, | 11 | ·······/˘/˘ |
| Over the woodlands brown and bare, | 8 | ···/···· |
| Over the harvest-fields forsaken, | 9 | ···/˘·˘/˘ |
| Silent, and soft, and slow | 6 | /˘···· |
| Descends the snow. | 4 | ˘/·· |
| Even as our cloudy fancies take | 10 | /˘·/˘/˘/˘· |
| Suddenly shape in some divine expression, | 11 | /˘˘···˘/˘/˘ |
| Even as the troubled heart doth make | 10 | /˘··/˘˘··· |
| In the white countenance confession, | 9 | ···/˘˘˘/˘ |
| The troubled sky reveals | 6 | ·/˘·˘/ |
| The grief it feels. | 4 | ···· |
| This is the poem of the air, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Slowly in silent syllables recorded; | 11 | /˘·/˘/˘˘˘/˘ |
| This is the secret of despair, | 8 | ···/˘·˘/ |
| Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded, | 9 | ···/˘/˘/˘ |
| Now whispered and revealed | 6 | ·/˘·˘/ |
| To wood and field. | 4 | ···· |
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.