Courante Monsieur
That frown, Aminta, now hath drown'dThy bright front's pow'r, and crown'dMe that was bound.No, no, deceived cruel, no!Love's fiery darts,Till tipt with kisses, never kindle hearts.
Adieu, weak beauteous tyrant, see!Thy angry flames meant me,Retort on thee:For know, it is decreed, proud fair,I ne'r must dyeBy any scorching, but a melting, eye.
Words in this poem
- beauteous a.
- Full of beauty; beautiful; very handsome. [Mostly poetic] -- Beau"te*ous*ly, adv. --
- angry a.
- Troublesome; vexatious; rigorous. [See Anger.]
- scorching a.
- Burning; parching or shriveling with heat.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Courante Monsieur is in the public domain. This text is taken from Lucasta, Project Gutenberg ebook #703; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Richard Lovelace, Courante Monsieur, in Lucasta (1649), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #703, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/lovelace-lucasta/courante-monsieur.html, id L13039.
Form and metre
Courante Monsieur is 12 lines in 2 stanzas of 6 lines each. It is in rhyming couplets, 67% of the lines: octosyllabic couplets. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic tetrameter. 90% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 6.8 syllables. 25% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in octosyllabic couplets, 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 AAA-BB drown'dA · crown'dA · boundA · no · dartsB · heartsB
- 2 AAA-BB seeA · meA · theeA · fair · dyeB · eyeB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| That frown, Aminta, now hath drown'd | 8 | ··˘/˘··· |
| Thy bright front's pow'r, and crown'd | 6 | ······ |
| Me that was bound. | 4 | ···· |
| No, no, deceived cruel, no! | 7 | ··˘//˘· |
| Love's fiery darts, | 5 | ·/˘˘· |
| Till tipt with kisses, never kindle hearts. | 10 | ···/˘/˘/˘· |
| Adieu, weak beauteous tyrant, see! | 9 | ˘/·/˘˘/˘· |
| Thy angry flames meant me, | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Retort on thee: | 4 | /··· |
| For know, it is decreed, proud fair, | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| I ne'r must dye | 4 | ···· |
| By any scorching, but a melting, eye. | 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.