The Star
Last nightI watched a star fall like a great pearl into the sea,Till my ego expanding encompassed sea and star,Containing both as in a trembling cup.
About this text
The Star 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 Star, in The Ghetto, and Other Poems (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4332, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/ridge-ghetto/the-star.html, id L20917.
Form and metre
The Star is 4 lines in a single stanza.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Last night | 2 | ·· |
| I watched a star fall like a great pearl into the sea, | 13 | ············· |
| Till my ego expanding encompassed sea and star, | 13 | ··/˘˘/˘˘/˘··· |
| Containing both as in a trembling cup. | 11 | ˘/˘····/˘˘· |
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.