Love's Vain Expense
Give back unto mine eyes, ye fount and rill,Those streams, not yours, that are so full and strong,That swell your springs, and roll your waves alongWith force unwonted in your native hill!
And thou, dense air, weighed with my sighs so chill,That hidest heaven's own light thick mists among,Give back those sighs to my sad heart, nor wrongMy visual ray with thy dark face of ill!
Let earth give back the footprints that I wore,That the bare grass I spoiled may sprout again;And Echo, now grown deaf, my cries return!
Loved eyes, unto mine eyes those looks restore,And let me woo another not in vain,Since how to please thee I shall never learn!
Words in this poem
- rill n.
- A very small brook; a streamlet. [Cf. LG. rille a small channel or brook, a furrow, a chamfer, OE. rigol a small brook, F. rigole a trench or furrow for water, W. rhill a row, rhigol a little di]
- unwonted a.
- Not wonted; unaccustomed; unused; not made familiar by practice; as, a child unwonted to strangers.
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Love's Vain Expense is in the public domain. This text is taken from Sonnets, Project Gutenberg ebook #10314, the John Addington Symonds translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Michelangelo Buonarroti, Love's Vain Expense, in Sonnets (1878), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #10314, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/michelangelo-sonnets/love-s-vain-expense.html, id L15180.
Form and metre
Love's Vain Expense is 14 lines in 4 stanzas. The rhyme scheme is ABBA, complete in 2 of its 4 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 89%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.1 syllables. 14% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 ABBA rillA · strongB · alongB · hillA
- 2 ABBA chillA · amongB · wrongB · illA
- 3 C-D woreC · again · returnD
- 4 C-D restoreC · vain · learnD
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Give back unto mine eyes, ye fount and rill, | 10 | ·········· |
| Those streams, not yours, that are so full and strong, | 10 | ·········· |
| That swell your springs, and roll your waves along | 10 | ········˘/ |
| With force unwonted in your native hill! | 10 | ··˘/˘··/˘· |
| And thou, dense air, weighed with my sighs so chill, | 10 | ·········· |
| That hidest heaven's own light thick mists among, | 11 | ···/˘······ |
| Give back those sighs to my sad heart, nor wrong | 10 | ·········· |
| My visual ray with thy dark face of ill! | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Let earth give back the footprints that I wore, | 10 | ·····/···· |
| That the bare grass I spoiled may sprout again; | 10 | ········˘/ |
| And Echo, now grown deaf, my cries return! | 10 | ·/˘·····˘/ |
| Loved eyes, unto mine eyes those looks restore, | 10 | ········˘/ |
| And let me woo another not in vain, | 10 | ····˘/˘··· |
| Since how to please thee I shall never learn! | 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.