Sonnet IV
I could not think of thee as piecèd rot,Yet such thou wert, for thou hadst been long dead;Yet thou liv’dst entire in my seeing thoughtAnd what thou wert in me had never fled.Nay, I had fixed the moments of thy beauty—Thy ebbing smile, thy kiss’s readiness,And memory had taught my heart the dutyTo know thee ever at that deathlessness.But when I came where thou wert laid, and sawThe natural flowers ignoring thee sans blame,And the encroaching grass, with casual flaw,Framing the stone to age where was thy name,I knew not how to feel, nor what to beTowards thy fate’s material secrecy.
Words in this poem
- sans prep.
- Without; deprived or destitute of. Rarely used as an English word. [F., from L. sine without.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sonnet IV is in the public domain. This text is taken from 35 Sonnets, Project Gutenberg ebook #19978; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Fernando Pessoa, Sonnet IV, in 35 Sonnets (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #19978, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/pessoa-35-sonnets/sonnet-iv.html, id L23633.
Form and metre
Sonnet IV is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABABCDCDEFEFGG, the pattern of the English sonnet. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 81%).
See other English sonnets, 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 ABABCDCDEFEFGG rotA · deadB · thoughtA · fledB · beautyC · readinessD · dutyC · deathlessnessD · sawE · blameF · flawE · nameF · beG · secrecyG
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I could not think of thee as piecèd rot, | 9 | ········· |
| Yet such thou wert, for thou hadst been long dead; | 10 | ·········· |
| Yet thou liv’dst entire in my seeing thought | 10 | ···˘/··/˘· |
| And what thou wert in me had never fled. | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Nay, I had fixed the moments of thy beauty— | 11 | ·····/˘··/˘ |
| Thy ebbing smile, thy kiss’s readiness, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/˘˘ |
| And memory had taught my heart the duty | 11 | ·/˘˘·····/˘ |
| To know thee ever at that deathlessness. | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| But when I came where thou wert laid, and saw | 10 | ·········· |
| The natural flowers ignoring thee sans blame, | 10 | ·/˘/˘/˘··· |
| And the encroaching grass, with casual flaw, | 10 | ··˘/˘··/˘· |
| Framing the stone to age where was thy name, | 10 | /˘········ |
| I knew not how to feel, nor what to be | 10 | ·········· |
| Towards thy fate’s material secrecy. | 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.