Supplication
Give me heart-touch with all that live,And strength to speak my word;But if that is denied me, giveThe strength to live unheard.
Words in this poem
- unheard a.
- Not heard; not perceived by the ear; as, words unheard by those present.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Supplication is in the public domain. This text is taken from Lincoln & other poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #54527; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Edwin Markham, Supplication, in Lincoln and Other Poems (1901), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #54527, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/markham-lincoln/supplication.html, id L10833.
Form and metre
Supplication is 4 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABAB. The lines average 7.0 syllables.
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 ABAB liveA · wordB · giveA · unheardB
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Give me heart-touch with all that live, | 8 | ········ |
| And strength to speak my word; | 6 | ······ |
| But if that is denied me, give | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| The strength to live unheard. | 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.