An Autumn Song
Are the leaves falling round aboutThe churchyard on the hill?Is the glow of autumn going out?Is that the winter chill?And yet through winter's noise, no doubtThe graves are very still!
Are the woods empty, voiceless, bare?On sodden leaves do you tread?Is nothing left of all those fair?Is the whole summer fled?Well, so from this unwholesome airHave gone away these dead!
The seasons pierce me; like a leafI feel the autumn blow,And tremble between nature's griefAnd the silent death below.O Summer, thou art very brief!Where do these exiles go?
Words in this poem
- churchyard n.
- The ground adjoining a church, in which the dead are buried; a cemetery.
- voiceless a.
- Having no voice, utterance, or vote; silent; mute; dumb.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
An Autumn Song is in the public domain. This text is taken from The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes — Volume 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #9984; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: George MacDonald, An Autumn Song, in A Microcosm in Terza Rima, and Other Poems (1893), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #9984, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/macdonald-poems/an-autumn-song.html, id L22381.
Form and metre
An Autumn Song is 18 lines in 3 stanzas of 6 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABABAB. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%).
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 ABABAB aboutA · hillB · outA · chillB · doubtA · stillB
- 2 ABABAB bareA · treadB · fairA · fledB · airA · deadB
- 3 ABABAB leafA · blowB · griefA · belowB · briefA · goB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Are the leaves falling round about | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The churchyard on the hill? | 6 | ·/···· |
| Is the glow of autumn going out? | 9 | ····/˘/˘· |
| Is that the winter chill? | 6 | ···/˘· |
| And yet through winter's noise, no doubt | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The graves are very still! | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Are the woods empty, voiceless, bare? | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| On sodden leaves do you tread? | 7 | ·/˘···· |
| Is nothing left of all those fair? | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Is the whole summer fled? | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Well, so from this unwholesome air | 9 | ········· |
| Have gone away these dead! | 6 | ··˘/·· |
| The seasons pierce me; like a leaf | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| I feel the autumn blow, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| And tremble between nature's grief | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| And the silent death below. | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| O Summer, thou art very brief! | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Where do these exiles go? | 6 | ···/·· |
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.