The Little Dove
The little dove, with heart of sadness,In silent pain sighs night and day,What now can wake that heart to gladness?His mate beloved is far away.
He coos no more with soft caresses,No more is millet sought by him,The dove his lonesome state distresses,And tears his swimming eyeballs dim.
From twig to twig now skips the lover,Filling the grove with accents kind,On all sides roams the harmless rover,Hoping his little friend to find.
Ah! vain that hope his grief is tasting,Fate seems to scorn his faithful love,And imperceptibly is wasting,Wasting away, the little dove!
At length upon the grass he threw him,Hid in his wing his beak and wept,There ceased his sorrows to pursue him,The little dove for ever slept.
His mate, now sad abroad and grieving,Flies from a distance home again,Sits by her friend, with bosom heaving,And bids him wake with sorrowing pain.
She sighs, she weeps, her spirits languish,Around and round the spot she goes,Ah! charming Chloe's lost in anguish,Her friend wakes not from his repose!
Words in this poem
- sadness n.
- Heaviness; firmness.
- lonesome a.
- Secluded from society; not frequented by human beings; solitary.
- rover n.
- One who practices robbery on the seas; a pirate. [D. roover a robber. See Rove, v. i.]
- languish v. i.
- To cause to dr Shak.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Little Dove is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Bakchesarian Fountain and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #8192; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Alexander Pushkin, The Little Dove, in The Bakchesarian Fountain and Other Poems (1849), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #8192, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/pushkin-bakchesarian/by-dmetrieff.html, id L25567.
Form and metre
The Little Dove is 28 lines in 7 stanzas of 4 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABAB, complete in 6 of its 7 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 94%).
See 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 ABAB sadnessA · dayB · gladnessA · awayB
- 2 ABAB caressesA · himB · distressesA · dimB
- 3 -A-A lover · kindA · rover · findA
- 4 ABAB tastingA · loveB · wastingA · doveB
- 5 ABAB himA · weptB · himA · sleptB
- 6 ABAB grievingA · againB · heavingA · painB
- 7 ABAB languishA · goesB · anguishA · reposeB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| The little dove, with heart of sadness, | 9 | ·/˘····/˘ |
| In silent pain sighs night and day, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| What now can wake that heart to gladness? | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| His mate beloved is far away. | 8 | ··˘/··˘/ |
| He coos no more with soft caresses, | 9 | ······˘/˘ |
| No more is millet sought by him, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The dove his lonesome state distresses, | 9 | ···/˘·˘/˘ |
| And tears his swimming eyeballs dim. | 8 | ···/˘/·· |
| From twig to twig now skips the lover, | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| Filling the grove with accents kind, | 8 | /˘···/˘· |
| On all sides roams the harmless rover, | 9 | ·····/˘/˘ |
| Hoping his little friend to find. | 8 | /˘·/˘··· |
| Ah! vain that hope his grief is tasting, | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| Fate seems to scorn his faithful love, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And imperceptibly is wasting, | 9 | ··˘/˘˘·/˘ |
| Wasting away, the little dove! | 8 | /˘˘/·/˘· |
| At length upon the grass he threw him, | 9 | ········· |
| Hid in his wing his beak and wept, | 8 | ········ |
| There ceased his sorrows to pursue him, | 9 | ···/˘·˘/· |
| The little dove for ever slept. | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| His mate, now sad abroad and grieving, | 9 | ····˘/·/˘ |
| Flies from a distance home again, | 8 | ···/˘·˘/ |
| Sits by her friend, with bosom heaving, | 9 | ·····/˘/˘ |
| And bids him wake with sorrowing pain. | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| She sighs, she weeps, her spirits languish, | 9 | ·····/˘/˘ |
| Around and round the spot she goes, | 8 | ········ |
| Ah! charming Chloe's lost in anguish, | 9 | ·/˘/˘··/˘ |
| Her friend wakes not from his repose! | 8 | ······˘/ |
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.