The Fire
The old men of the world have made a fireTo warm their trembling hands.They poke the young men in.The young men burn like withes.
If one run a little way,The old men are wrath.They catch him and bind him and throw him again to the flames.Green withes burn slow...And the smoke of the young men's tormentRises round and sheer as the trunk of a pillared oak,And the darkness thereof spreads over the sky....
Green withes burn slow...And the old men of the world sit round the fireAnd rub their hands....But the smoke of the young men's tormentAscends up for ever and ever.
Words in this poem
- pillared a.
- Supported or ornamented by pillars; resembling a pillar, or pillars.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Fire is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Ghetto, and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #4332; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Lola Ridge, The Fire, in The Ghetto, and Other Poems (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4332, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/ridge-ghetto/the-fire.html, id L20909.
Form and metre
The Fire is 16 lines in 3 stanzas.
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.
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| The old men of the world have made a fire | 11 | ·········/˘ |
| To warm their trembling hands. | 7 | ···/˘˘· |
| They poke the young men in. | 6 | ······ |
| The young men burn like withes. | 6 | ······ |
| If one run a little way, | 7 | ····/˘· |
| The old men are wrath. | 5 | ····· |
| They catch him and bind him and throw him again to the flames. | 14 | ·········˘/··· |
| Green withes burn slow... | 4 | ···· |
| And the smoke of the young men's torment | 9 | ·······/· |
| Rises round and sheer as the trunk of a pillared oak, | 13 | /˘········/˘· |
| And the darkness thereof spreads over the sky.... | 11 | ··/˘······· |
| Green withes burn slow... | 4 | ···· |
| And the old men of the world sit round the fire | 12 | ··········/˘ |
| And rub their hands.... | 4 | ···· |
| But the smoke of the young men's torment | 9 | ·······/· |
| Ascends up for ever and ever. | 9 | ˘/··/˘·/˘ |
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.