Jessie
When Jessie comes with her soft breast,And yields the golden keys,Then is it as if God caress’dTwin babes upon His knees--Twin babes that, each to other press’d,Just feel the Father’s arms, wherewith they both are bless’d.
But when I think if we must part,And all this personal dream be fled--O then my heart! O then my useless heart!Would God that thou wert dead--A clod insensible to joys and ills--A stone remote in some bleak gully of the hills!
Words in this poem
- wherewith adv.
- With which; -- used relatively.
- clod n.
- A lump or mass, especially of earth, turf, or clay. [OE. clodde, latter form of clot. See Clot.]
- gully v. i.
- To flow noisily. Johnson.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Jessie is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Oxford Book of English Verse, 1250-1900, Project Gutenberg ebook #66619; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Thomas Edward Brown, Jessie, in Poems (1830–1897), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #66619, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/obev-thomas-edward-brown/jessie.html, id L16243.
Form and metre
Jessie is 12 lines in 2 stanzas of 6 lines each. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic pentameter. 95% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.6 syllables. 8% 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 ABABAA breastA · keysB · caress'dA · kneesB · press'dA · bless'dA
- 2 ABABCC partA · fledB · heartA · deadB · illsC · hillsC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| When Jessie comes with her soft breast, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| And yields the golden keys, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Then is it as if God caress’d | 8 | ······˘/ |
| Twin babes upon His knees-- | 6 | ······ |
| Twin babes that, each to other press’d, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Just feel the Father’s arms, wherewith they both are bless’d. | 12 | ···/˘·˘/···· |
| But when I think if we must part, | 8 | ········ |
| And all this personal dream be fled-- | 9 | ···/˘˘··· |
| O then my heart! O then my useless heart! | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Would God that thou wert dead-- | 6 | ······ |
| A clod insensible to joys and ills-- | 10 | ··˘/˘˘···· |
| A stone remote in some bleak gully of the hills! | 12 | ··˘/···/˘··· |
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.