Sonnet XXIV
Something in me was born before the starsAnd saw the sun begin from far away.Our yellow, local day on its wont jars,For it hath communed with an absolute day.Through my Thought’s night, as a worn robe’s heard trailThat I have never seen, I drag this pastThat saw the Possible like a dawn grow paleOn the lost night before it, mute and vast.It dates remoter than God’s birth can reach,That had no birth but the world’s coming after.So the world’s to me as, after whispered speech,The cause-ignored sudden echoing of laughter.That ’t has a meaning my conjecture knows,But that ’t has meaning’s all its meaning shows.
About this text
Sonnet XXIV 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 XXIV, in 35 Sonnets (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #19978, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/pessoa-35-sonnets/sonnet-xxiv.html, id L23653.
Form and metre
Sonnet XXIV 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 82%).
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 starsA · awayB · jarsA · dayB · trailC · pastD · paleC · vastD · reachE · afterF · speechE · laughterF · knowsG · showsG
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Something in me was born before the stars | 10 | /˘········ |
| And saw the sun begin from far away. | 10 | ····˘/··˘/ |
| Our yellow, local day on its wont jars, | 10 | //˘/˘····· |
| For it hath communed with an absolute day. | 11 | ···/˘··/˘·· |
| Through my Thought’s night, as a worn robe’s heard trail | 10 | ·········· |
| That I have never seen, I drag this past | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| That saw the Possible like a dawn grow pale | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| On the lost night before it, mute and vast. | 10 | ·········· |
| It dates remoter than God’s birth can reach, | 10 | ·········· |
| That had no birth but the world’s coming after. | 11 | ·······/˘·· |
| So the world’s to me as, after whispered speech, | 11 | ········/˘· |
| The cause-ignored sudden echoing of laughter. | 11 | ··˘//˘/˘·/˘ |
| That ’t has a meaning my conjecture knows, | 11 | ····/˘·˘/˘· |
| But that ’t has meaning’s all its meaning shows. | 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.