The Tidings
Censored lies that mimic truth...Censored truth as pale as fear...My heart is like a rousing bell--And but the dead to hear...
My heart is like a mother bird,Circling ever higher,And the nest-tree rimmed aboutBy a forest fire...
My heart is like a lover foiledBy a broken stair--They are fighting to-night in Sackville Street,And I am not there!
About this text
The Tidings 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 Tidings, in The Ghetto, and Other Poems (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4332, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/ridge-ghetto/the-tidings.html, id L20918.
Form and metre
The Tidings is 12 lines in 3 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is common measure, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%).
See other poems in common measure.
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 -A-A truth · fearA · bell · hearA
- 2 -A-A bird · higherA · about · fireA
- 3 -A-A foiled · stairA · street · thereA
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 common measure. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Censored lies that mimic truth... | 7 | /˘··/˘· |
| Censored truth as pale as fear... | 7 | /˘····· |
| My heart is like a rousing bell-- | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And but the dead to hear... | 6 | ······ |
| My heart is like a mother bird, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Circling ever higher, | 7 | /˘˘/˘/˘ |
| And the nest-tree rimmed about | 7 | ······· |
| By a forest fire... | 6 | ··/˘/˘ |
| My heart is like a lover foiled | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| By a broken stair-- | 5 | ··/˘· |
| They are fighting to-night in Sackville Street, | 10 | ··/˘···/·· |
| And I am not there! | 5 | ····· |
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.