The Sea to the Shore
Lo, I have loved thee long, long have I yearned and entreated!Tell me how I may win thee, tell me how I must woo.Shall I creep to thy white feet, in guise of a humble lover?Shall I croon in mild petition, murmuring vows anew?
Shall I stretch my arms unto thee, biding thy maiden coyness,Under the silver of morning, under the purple of night?Taming my ancient rudeness, checking my heady clamor—Thus, is it thus I must woo thee, oh, my delight?
Nay, 'tis no way of the sea thus to be meekly suitor—I shall storm thee away with laughter wrapped in my beard of snow,With the wildest of billows for chords I shall harp thee a song for thy bridal,A mighty lyric of love that feared not nor would forego!
With a red-gold wedding ring, mined from the caves of sunset,Fast shall I bind thy faith to my faith evermore,And the stars will wait on our pleasure, the great north wind will trumpetA thunderous marriage march for the nuptials of sea and shore.
Words in this poem
- 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,]
- croon v. i.
- To make a continuous hollow moan, as cattle do when in pain.
- biding n.
- Residence; habitation. Rowe.
- heady a.
- Willful; rash; precipitate; hurried on by will or passion; ungovernable. [From Head.]
- meekly adv.
- In a meek manner.
- suitor n.
- One who sues, petitions, or entreats; a petitioner; an applicant.
- forego v. t.
- To quit; to relinquish; to leave. [See Forgo.]
- evermore adv.
- During eternity; always; forever; for an indefinite period; at all times; -- often used substantively with for.
- thunderous a.
- Producing thunder. [Written also thundrous.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Sea to the Shore is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Watchman and Other Poems (New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1917; Toronto: McClelland, Goodchild and Stewart, 1916), Internet Archive; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: L. M. Montgomery, The Sea to the Shore, in The Watchman and Other Poems (1916), text of Internet Archive, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/montgomery-watchman/the-sea-to-the-shore.html, id L29377.
Form and metre
The Sea to the Shore is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic pentameter.
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 -A-A entreated · wooA · lover · anewA
- 2 -A-A coyness · nightA · clamor · delightA
- 3 -A-A suitor · snowA · bridal · foregoA
- 4 ABAB sunsetA · evermoreB · trumpetA · shoreB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Lo, I have loved thee long, long have I yearned and entreated! | 14 | ·············· |
| Tell me how I may win thee, tell me how I must woo. | 13 | ············· |
| Shall I creep to thy white feet, in guise of a humble lover? | 15 | ···········/˘/˘ |
| Shall I croon in mild petition, murmuring vows anew? | 13 | ·····˘/˘/˘·˘/ |
| Shall I stretch my arms unto thee, biding thy maiden coyness, | 15 | ········/˘·/˘/˘ |
| Under the silver of morning, under the purple of night? | 15 | ···/˘·/˘···/˘·· |
| Taming my ancient rudeness, checking my heady clamor— | 14 | /˘·/˘/˘/˘·/˘/˘ |
| Thus, is it thus I must woo thee, oh, my delight? | 12 | ··········˘/ |
| Nay, 'tis no way of the sea thus to be meekly suitor— | 14 | ··········/˘/˘ |
| I shall storm thee away with laughter wrapped in my beard of snow, | 15 | ····˘/·/˘······ |
| With the wildest of billows for chords I shall harp thee a song for thy bridal, | 19 | ··/˘·/˘··········/˘ |
| A mighty lyric of love that feared not nor would forego! | 14 | ·/˘/˘·······˘/ |
| With a red-gold wedding ring, mined from the caves of sunset, | 14 | ····/˘······/· |
| Fast shall I bind thy faith to my faith evermore, | 12 | ·········/˘· |
| And the stars will wait on our pleasure, the great north wind will trumpet | 16 | ······//˘·····/˘ |
| A thunderous marriage march for the nuptials of sea and shore. | 14 | ·/˘/˘···/˘···· |
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.