Her Heart
Her heart is always doing lovely things,Filling my wintry mind with simple flowers;Playing sweet tunes on my untuned strings,Delighting all my undelightful hours.
She plays me like a lute, what tune she will,No string in me but trembles at her touch,Shakes into sacred music, or is still,Trembles or stops, or swells, her skill is such.
And in the dusty tavern of my soulWhere filthy lusts drink witches' brew for wine,Her gentle hand still keeps me from the bowl,Still keeps me man, saves me from being swine.
All grace in me, all sweetness in my verse,Is hers, is my dear girl's, and only hers.
Words in this poem
- wintry a.
- Suitable to winter; resembling winter, or what belongs to winter; brumal; hyemal; cold; stormy; wintery. [AS. wintrig.]
- brew v. t.
- To boil or seethe; to cook. [OE. brewen, AS. breówan; akin to D. brouwen, OHG. priuwan, MHG. briuwen, br, G. brauen, Icel. brugga, Sw. brygga, Dan. brygge, and perh. to L. defrutum must boi]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Her Heart is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Story of a Round-House, and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #40717; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: John Masefield, Her Heart, in The Story of a Round-House, and Other Poems (1912), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #40717, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/masefield-round-house/her-heart.html, id L25016.
Form and metre
Her Heart is 14 lines in 4 stanzas. The rhyme scheme is ABAB, complete in 3 of its 4 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 thingsA · flowersB · stringsA · hoursB
- 2 ABAB willA · touchB · stillA · suchB
- 3 ABAB soulA · wineB · bowlA · swineB
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 pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Her heart is always doing lovely things, | 10 | ···/·/˘/˘· |
| Filling my wintry mind with simple flowers; | 11 | /˘·/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Playing sweet tunes on my untuned strings, | 10 | /˘······˘· |
| Delighting all my undelightful hours. | 11 | ˘/˘······/˘ |
| She plays me like a lute, what tune she will, | 10 | ·········· |
| No string in me but trembles at her touch, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Shakes into sacred music, or is still, | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Trembles or stops, or swells, her skill is such. | 10 | /˘········ |
| And in the dusty tavern of my soul | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Where filthy lusts drink witches' brew for wine, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| Her gentle hand still keeps me from the bowl, | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Still keeps me man, saves me from being swine. | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| All grace in me, all sweetness in my verse, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Is hers, is my dear girl's, and only hers. | 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.