Poems
except War.Above all, this book is not concerned with Poetry.The subject of it is War, and the pity of War.The Poetry is in the pity.Yet these elegies are not to this generation,This is in no sense consolatory.
They may be to the next.All the poet can do to-day is to warn.That is why the true Poets must be truthful.If I thought the letter of this book would last,I might have used proper names; but if the spirit of it survivesPrussia,--my ambition and those names will be content; for they willhave achieved themselves fresher fields than Flanders.
Words in this poem
- consolatory a.
- Of a consoling or comforting nature. [L. consolatorius.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Poems is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #1034; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Wilfred Owen, Poems, (1920), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1034, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/owen-poems/poems.html, id L26125.
Form and metre
Poems is 13 lines in 2 stanzas. 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--- warA · poetry · warA · pity · generation · consolatory
- 2 --A--A- next · warn · truthfulA · last · survives · willA · flanders
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 |
|---|---|---|
| except War. | 3 | ··· |
| Above all, this book is not concerned with Poetry. | 12 | ·······˘/·/˘ |
| The subject of it is War, and the pity of War. | 13 | ·/˘······/˘·· |
| The Poetry is in the pity. | 9 | ·/˘˘···/˘ |
| Yet these elegies are not to this generation, | 12 | ··/˘·····˘/˘ |
| This is in no sense consolatory. | 10 | ·····˘/˘˘˘ |
| They may be to the next. | 6 | ······ |
| All the poet can do to-day is to warn. | 11 | ··/˘······· |
| That is why the true Poets must be truthful. | 11 | ·····/˘··/˘ |
| If I thought the letter of this book would last, | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| I might have used proper names; but if the spirit of it survives | 15 | ····/˘····/··˘/ |
| Prussia,--my ambition and those names will be content; for they will | 16 | /˘·˘/˘·····˘/··· |
| have achieved themselves fresher fields than Flanders. | 11 | ·˘/˘//˘··/˘ |
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.