The Last Rose of Summer
’Tis the last rose of summerLeft blooming alone;All her lovely companionsAre faded and gone;No flower of her kindred,No rose-bud is nigh,To reflect back her blushes,Or give sigh for sigh.
I’ll not leave thee, thou lone one!To pine on the stem;Since the lovely are sleeping,Go, sleep thou with them.Thus kindly I scatterThy leaves o’er the bedWhere thy mates of the gardenLie scentless and dead.
So soon may I follow,When friendships decay,And from Love’s shining circleThe gems drop away.When true hearts lie withered,And fond ones are flown,O! who would inhabitThis bleak world alone?
Words in this poem
- lone n.
- A lane. See Loanin.
- scentless a.
- Having no scent.
- flown a.
- Flushed, inflated.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Last Rose of Summer is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems Every Child Should Know The What-Every-Child-Should-Know-Library, Project Gutenberg ebook #16436; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Mary E. Burt, The Last Rose of Summer, in Poems Every Child Should Know (1904), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #16436, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/poems-every-child/the-last-rose-of-summer.html, id L25281.
Form and metre
The Last Rose of Summer is 24 lines in 3 stanzas of 8 lines each. The metre is anapaestic dimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 87%).
See other poems in anapaestic dimeter.
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 summer · alone · companions · gone · kindred · nighA · blushes · sighA
- 2 -A-A-B-B one · stemA · sleeping · themA · scatter · bedB · garden · deadB
- 3 -A-A-B-B follow · decayA · circle · awayA · withered · flownB · inhabit · aloneB
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 anapaestic dimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| ’Tis the last rose of summer | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| Left blooming alone; | 5 | ·/˘˘/ |
| All her lovely companions | 7 | ··/˘˘/˘ |
| Are faded and gone; | 5 | ·/˘·· |
| No flower of her kindred, | 6 | ·/··/˘ |
| No rose-bud is nigh, | 5 | ····· |
| To reflect back her blushes, | 7 | ·˘/··/˘ |
| Or give sigh for sigh. | 5 | ····· |
| I’ll not leave thee, thou lone one! | 7 | ······· |
| To pine on the stem; | 5 | ····· |
| Since the lovely are sleeping, | 7 | ··/˘·/˘ |
| Go, sleep thou with them. | 5 | ····· |
| Thus kindly I scatter | 6 | ·/˘·/˘ |
| Thy leaves o’er the bed | 5 | ····· |
| Where thy mates of the garden | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| Lie scentless and dead. | 5 | ·/˘·· |
| So soon may I follow, | 6 | ····/˘ |
| When friendships decay, | 5 | ·/˘˘/ |
| And from Love’s shining circle | 7 | ···/˘/˘ |
| The gems drop away. | 5 | ···˘/ |
| When true hearts lie withered, | 6 | ····/˘ |
| And fond ones are flown, | 5 | ····· |
| O! who would inhabit | 6 | ···˘/˘ |
| This bleak world alone? | 5 | ···˘/ |
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.