Ballade of Dead Friends
As we the withered fernsBy the roadway lying,Time, the jester, spurnsAll our prayers and prying --All our tears and sighing,Sorrow, change, and woe --All our where-and-whyingFor friends that come and go.
Life awakes and burns,Age and death defying,Till at last it learnsAll but Love is dying;Love's the trade we're plying,God has willed it so;Shrouds are what we're buyingFor friends that come and go.
Man forever yearnsFor the thing that's flying.Everywhere he turns,Men to dust are drying, --Dust that wanders, eying(With eyes that hardly glow)New faces, dimly spyingFor friends that come and go.
Words in this poem
- roadway n.
- A road; especially, the part traveled by carriages.
- prying a.
- Inspecting closely or impertinently.
- dimly adv.
- In a dim or obscure manner; not brightly or clearly; with imperfect sight.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Ballade of Dead Friends is in the public domain. This text is taken from Children of the Night, Project Gutenberg ebook #313; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Edwin Arlington Robinson, Ballade of Dead Friends, in The Children of the Night (1897), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #313, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/robinson-children-of-night/ballade-of-dead-friends.html, id L07979.
Form and metre
Ballade of Dead Friends is 24 lines in 3 stanzas of 8 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABABBCBC. The metre is trochaic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 5.8 syllables. 10 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 33% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in trochaic trimeter.
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 ABABBCBC fernsA · lyingB · spurnsA · pryingB · sighingB · woeC · whyingB · goC
- 2 ABABBCBC burnsA · defyingB · learnsA · dyingB · plyingB · soC · buyingB · goC
- 3 ABABBCBC yearnsA · flyingB · turnsA · dryingB · eyingB · glowC · spyingB · goC
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 trochaic trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| As we the withered ferns | 6 | ···/˘· |
| By the roadway lying, | 6 | ··/·/˘ |
| Time, the jester, spurns | 5 | ··/˘· |
| All our prayers and prying -- | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
| All our tears and sighing, | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
| Sorrow, change, and woe -- | 5 | /˘··· |
| All our where-and-whying | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| For friends that come and go. | 6 | ······ |
| Life awakes and burns, | 5 | ·˘/·· |
| Age and death defying, | 6 | ···˘/˘ |
| Till at last it learns | 5 | ····· |
| All but Love is dying; | 6 | ····/˘ |
| Love's the trade we're plying, | 6 | ····/˘ |
| God has willed it so; | 5 | ····· |
| Shrouds are what we're buying | 6 | ····/˘ |
| For friends that come and go. | 6 | ······ |
| Man forever yearns | 5 | ·˘/˘· |
| For the thing that's flying. | 6 | ····/˘ |
| Everywhere he turns, | 5 | /˘··· |
| Men to dust are drying, -- | 6 | ····/˘ |
| Dust that wanders, eying | 5 | ··/˘· |
| (With eyes that hardly glow) | 6 | ···/˘· |
| New faces, dimly spying | 7 | ·/˘/˘/˘ |
| For friends that come and go. | 6 | ······ |
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.