His Heart Is All in Flames, but His Tongue Is Mute, in Her Presence
If fire was never yet by fire subdued,If never flood fell dry by frequent rain,But, like to like, if each by other gain,And contraries are often mutual food;Love, who our thoughts controllest in each mood,Through whom two bodies thus one soul sustain,How, why in her, with such unusual strainMake the want less by wishes long renewed?Perchance, as falleth the broad Nile from high,Deafening with his great voice all nature round,And as the sun still dazzles the fix'd eye,So with itself desire in discord foundLoses in its impetuous object force,As the too frequent spur oft checks the course.
Words in this poem
- contraries n.
- Propositions which directly and destructively contradict each other, but of which the falsehood of one does not establish the truth of the other. [Pl. of Contrary, n.]
- deafening n.
- The act or process of rendering impervious to sound, as a floor or wall; also, the material with which the spaces are filled in this process; pugging.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
His Heart Is All in Flames, but His Tongue Is Mute, in Her Presence is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Sonnets, Triumphs and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #17650, the various hands translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Petrarch, His Heart Is All in Flames, but His Tongue Is Mute, in Her Presence, in The Sonnets, Triumphs and Other Poems (1859), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #17650, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/petrarch-sonnets/his-heart-is-all-in-flames-but-his-tongue-is-mute-in-her-pre.html, id L14537.
Form and metre
His Heart Is All in Flames, but His Tongue Is Mute, in Her Presence is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABBAABBACDCDCD, the pattern of the Italian sonnet. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 84%). 87% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.0 syllables. 14% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other Italian 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 ABBAABBACDCDCD subduedA · rainB · gainB · foodA · moodA · sustainB · strainB · renewedA · highC · roundD · eyeC · foundD · forceC · courseD
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 |
|---|---|---|
| If fire was never yet by fire subdued, | 10 | ·/·/··/˘˘/ |
| If never flood fell dry by frequent rain, | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| But, like to like, if each by other gain, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| And contraries are often mutual food; | 10 | ·/˘·/˘/˘˘· |
| Love, who our thoughts controllest in each mood, | 10 | ··/·˘/˘··· |
| Through whom two bodies thus one soul sustain, | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| How, why in her, with such unusual strain | 10 | ······˘/˘· |
| Make the want less by wishes long renewed? | 10 | ·····/˘·˘/ |
| Perchance, as falleth the broad Nile from high, | 10 | ˘/·/˘····· |
| Deafening with his great voice all nature round, | 10 | /˘·····/˘· |
| And as the sun still dazzles the fix'd eye, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| So with itself desire in discord found | 10 | ··˘/˘/·/˘· |
| Loses in its impetuous object force, | 10 | /˘··˘/˘/˘· |
| As the too frequent spur oft checks the course. | 10 | ···/˘····· |
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.