The Old Garden V
The moon is dreaming upwardFrom a sea of cloud and gleam;She looks as if she had seen meNever but in a dream.
Down the stair I know she is coming,Bare-footed, lifting her train;It creaks not--she hears it creakingWhere once there was a brain.
Out at yon side-door she's coming,With a timid glance right and left;Her look is hopeless yet eager,The look of a heart bereft.
Across the lawn she is flitting,Her thin gown feels the wind;Are her white feet bending the grasses?Her hair is lifted behind!
Words in this poem
- flitting n.
- A flying with lightness and celerity; a fluttering.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Old Garden V 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, The Old Garden V, in A Microcosm in Terza Rima, and Other Poems (1893), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #9984, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/macdonald-poems/the-old-garden-v.html, id L22392.
Form and metre
The Old Garden V is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is common measure, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 78%).
See other poems in common measure.
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 -A-A upward · gleamA · me · dreamA
- 2 -A-A coming · trainA · creaking · brainA
- 3 -A-A coming · leftA · eager · bereftA
- 4 -A-A flitting · windA · grasses · behindA
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 common measure. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| The moon is dreaming upward | 7 | ···/˘/˘ |
| From a sea of cloud and gleam; | 7 | ······· |
| She looks as if she had seen me | 8 | ········ |
| Never but in a dream. | 6 | /˘···· |
| Down the stair I know she is coming, | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| Bare-footed, lifting her train; | 7 | ·/˘/˘·· |
| It creaks not--she hears it creaking | 8 | ······/˘ |
| Where once there was a brain. | 6 | ······ |
| Out at yon side-door she's coming, | 8 | ······/˘ |
| With a timid glance right and left; | 8 | ··/˘···· |
| Her look is hopeless yet eager, | 8 | ···/˘·/˘ |
| The look of a heart bereft. | 7 | ·····˘/ |
| Across the lawn she is flitting, | 8 | ˘/····/˘ |
| Her thin gown feels the wind; | 6 | ······ |
| Are her white feet bending the grasses? | 9 | ····/˘·/˘ |
| Her hair is lifted behind! | 7 | ···/˘·· |
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.