Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star
Twinkle, twinkle, little star!How I wonder what you are,Up above the world so high,Like a diamond in the sky.
When the glorious sun is set,When the grass with dew is wet,Then you show your little light,Twinkle, twinkle all the night.
In the dark-blue sky you keep,And often through my curtains peep,For you never shut your eye,Till the sun is in the sky.
As your bright and tiny sparkGuides the traveller in the dark,Though I know not what you are,Twinkle, twinkle, little star!
Words in this poem
- twinkle v. i.
- To open and shut the eye rapidly; to blink; to wink. [OE. twinklen, AS. twinclian; akin to OE. twinken to blink, wink, G. zwinken, zwinkern, and perhaps to E. twitch.]
- glorious a.
- Exhibiting attributes, qualities, or acts that are worthy of or receive glory; noble; praiseworthy; excellent; splendid; illustrious; inspiring admiration; as, glorious deeds. [OF. glorios, glorious, F. glorieux, fr. L. gloriosus. See Glory, n.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star 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, Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star, in Poems Every Child Should Know (1904), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #16436, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/poems-every-child/twinkle-twinkle-little-star.html, id L25157.
Form and metre
Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes AABB. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
See other poems in trochaic tetrameter.
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 AABB starA · areA · highB · skyB
- 2 AABB setA · wetA · lightB · nightB
- 3 AABB keepA · peepA · eyeB · skyB
- 4 AABB sparkA · darkA · areB · starB
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 trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Twinkle, twinkle, little star! | 7 | /˘/˘/˘· |
| How I wonder what you are, | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Up above the world so high, | 7 | ······· |
| Like a diamond in the sky. | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| When the glorious sun is set, | 8 | ··/˘˘··· |
| When the grass with dew is wet, | 7 | ······· |
| Then you show your little light, | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Twinkle, twinkle all the night. | 7 | /˘/˘··· |
| In the dark-blue sky you keep, | 7 | ······· |
| And often through my curtains peep, | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| For you never shut your eye, | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Till the sun is in the sky. | 7 | ······· |
| As your bright and tiny spark | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Guides the traveller in the dark, | 8 | ··/˘˘··· |
| Though I know not what you are, | 7 | ······· |
| Twinkle, twinkle, little star! | 7 | /˘/˘/˘· |
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.