Monition
A faint wind, blowing from World's End,Made strange the city street.A strange sound mingled in the fallOf the familiar feet.
Something unseen whirled with the leavesTo tap on door and sill.Something unknown went whispering byEven when the wind was still.
And men looked up with startled eyesAnd hurried on their way,As if they had been called, and toldHow brief their day.
Words in this poem
- unseen a.
- Not seen or discovered.
- went n.
- Course; way; path; journey; direction.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Monition is in the public domain. This text is taken from New Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #59897; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Charles G. D. Roberts, Monition, in New Poems (1919), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #59897, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/roberts-new-poems/monition.html, id L11121.
Form and metre
Monition is 12 lines in 3 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is common measure, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 93% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 6.8 syllables. 42% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 end · streetA · fall · feetA
- 2 -A-A leaves · sillA · by · stillA
- 3 -A-A eyes · wayA · told · dayA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| A faint wind, blowing from World's End, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Made strange the city street. | 6 | ···/˘· |
| A strange sound mingled in the fall | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Of the familiar feet. | 6 | ··˘/˘· |
| Something unseen whirled with the leaves | 8 | /˘˘/···· |
| To tap on door and sill. | 6 | ······ |
| Something unknown went whispering by | 8 | /˘˘/·/˘· |
| Even when the wind was still. | 6 | /····· |
| And men looked up with startled eyes | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And hurried on their way, | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| As if they had been called, and told | 8 | ········ |
| How brief their day. | 4 | ···· |
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.