The Golden City of St. Mary
Out beyond the sunset, could I but find the way,Is a sleepy blue laguna which widens to a bay,And there’s the Blessed City--so the sailors say--The Golden City of St. Mary.
It’s built of fair marble--white--without a stain,And in the cool twilight when the sea-winds waneThe bells chime faintly, like a soft, warm rain,In the Golden City of St. Mary.
Among the green palm-trees where the fire-flies shine,Are the white tavern tables where the gallants dine,Singing slow Spanish songs like old mulled wine,In the Golden City of St. Mary.
Oh I’ll be shipping sunset-wards and westward-hoThrough the green toppling combers a-shattering into snow,Till I come to quiet moorings and a watch below,In the Golden City of St. Mary.
Words in this poem
- chime n.
- The harmonious sound of bells, or of musical instruments. [OE. chimbe, prop., cymbal, OF. cymbe, cymble, in a dialectic form, chymble, F. cymbale, L. cymbalum, fr. Gr. Cymbal.]
- dine v. i.
- To eat the principal regular meal of the day; to take dinner. [F. dîner, OF. disner, LL. disnare, contr. fr. an assumed disjunare; dis- + an assumed junare (OF. juner) to fast, for L. jejunare, fr. jejunus fasting. See Jeju]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Golden City of St. Mary is in the public domain. This text is taken from Salt-Water Ballads, Project Gutenberg ebook #52761; 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, The Golden City of St. Mary, in Salt-Water Ballads (1902), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #52761, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/masefield-salt-water/the-golden-city-of-st-mary.html, id L12664.
Form and metre
The Golden City of St. Mary is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. It is in rhyming couplets, 50% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 77%). 92% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 11.4 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 12% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in heroic couplets, 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 AAA- wayA · bayA · sayA · mary
- 2 AAA- stainA · waneA · rainA · mary
- 3 AAA- shineA · dineA · wineA · mary
- 4 AAA- hoA · snowA · belowA · mary
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Out beyond the sunset, could I but find the way, | 12 | ····/······· |
| Is a sleepy blue laguna which widens to a bay, | 14 | ··/˘·˘/˘·/˘··· |
| And there’s the Blessed City--so the sailors say-- | 11 | ····/˘··/˘· |
| The Golden City of St. Mary. | 9 | ·/˘/˘··/˘ |
| It’s built of fair marble--white--without a stain, | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| And in the cool twilight when the sea-winds wane | 11 | ····/······ |
| The bells chime faintly, like a soft, warm rain, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| In the Golden City of St. Mary. | 10 | ··/˘/˘··/˘ |
| Among the green palm-trees where the fire-flies shine, | 12 | ········/˘·· |
| Are the white tavern tables where the gallants dine, | 12 | ···/˘/˘··/˘· |
| Singing slow Spanish songs like old mulled wine, | 10 | /˘·/˘····· |
| In the Golden City of St. Mary. | 10 | ··/˘/˘··/˘ |
| Oh I’ll be shipping sunset-wards and westward-ho | 12 | ···/˘/···/˘· |
| Through the green toppling combers a-shattering into snow, | 15 | ···/˘˘/˘·/˘˘··· |
| Till I come to quiet moorings and a watch below, | 13 | ····/˘/˘····· |
| In the Golden City of St. Mary. | 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.