Ortus
How have I laboured?How have I not labouredTo bring her soul to birth,To give these elements a name and a centre!
She is beautiful as the sunlight, and as fluid.She has no name, and no place.How have I laboured to bring her soul into separation;To give her a name and her being!
Surely you are bound and entwined,You are mingled with the elements unborn;I have loved a stream and a shadow.
I beseech you enter your life.I beseech you learn to say “I”When I question you:For you are no part, but a whole;No portion, but a being.
Words in this poem
- laboured a.
- Bearing marks of labor and effort; elaborately wrought; not easy or natural; as, labored poetry; a labored style.
- centre v. i.
- To be placed in a center; to be central.
- unborn a.
- Not born; no yet brought into life; being still to appear; future.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Ortus is in the public domain. This text is taken from Lustra of Ezra Pound, Project Gutenberg ebook #55564; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Ezra Pound, Ortus, in Lustra (1916), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #55564, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/pound-lustra/ortus.html, id L01250.
Form and metre
Ortus is 16 lines in 4 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 73%). 90% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.6 syllables. 7 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 6% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic 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 AA-- labouredA · labouredA · birth · centre
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| How have I laboured? | 5 | ···/˘ |
| How have I not laboured | 6 | ····/˘ |
| To bring her soul to birth, | 6 | ······ |
| To give these elements a name and a centre! | 12 | ···/˘˘····/˘ |
| She is beautiful as the sunlight, and as fluid. | 13 | ··/˘˘··/···/˘ |
| She has no name, and no place. | 7 | ······· |
| How have I laboured to bring her soul into separation; | 15 | ···/˘·······˘/˘ |
| To give her a name and her being! | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| Surely you are bound and entwined, | 8 | /˘····˘/ |
| You are mingled with the elements unborn; | 11 | ··/˘··/˘˘// |
| I have loved a stream and a shadow. | 9 | ·······/· |
| I beseech you enter your life. | 8 | ·˘/·/˘·· |
| I beseech you learn to say “I” | 8 | ·˘/····· |
| When I question you: | 5 | ··/˘· |
| For you are no part, but a whole; | 8 | ········ |
| No portion, but a being. | 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.