Three Quatrains
As long as Fame's imperious music ringsWill poets mock it with crowned words august;And haggard men will clamber to be kingsAs long as Glory weighs itself in dust.
Drink to the splendor of the unfulfilled,Nor shudder for the revels that are done:The wines that flushed Lucullus are all spilled,The strings that Nero fingered are all gone.
We cannot crown ourselves with everything,Nor can we coax the Fates for us to quarrel:No matter what we are, or what we sing,Time finds a withered leaf in every laurel.
Words in this poem
- imperious a.
- Commanding; ascendant; imperial; lordly; majestic. [L. imperiosus: cf. F. impérieux. See Imperial.]
- haggard a.
- Wild or intractable; disposed to break away from duty; untamed; as, a haggard or refractory hawk. Shak [F. hagard; of German origin, and prop. meaning, of the hegde or woods, wild, untamed. See Hedge, 1st Haw, and -ard.]
- clamber v. i.
- To climb with difficulty, or with hands and feet; -- also used figuratively. [OE clambren, clameren, to heap together, climb; akin to Icel. klambra to clamp, G. klammern. Cf. Clamp, Climb.]
- nero n.
- A Roman emperor notorius for debauchery and barbarous cruelty; hence, any profligate and cruel ruler or merciless tyrant.
- fingered a.
- Having fingers.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Three Quatrains 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, Three Quatrains, in The Children of the Night (1897), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #313, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/robinson-children-of-night/three-quatrains.html, id L07971.
Form and metre
Three Quatrains is 12 lines in 3 stanzas of 4 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABAB, complete in 2 of its 3 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 85%). 96% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.2 syllables. 3 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 17% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 ABAB ringsA · augustB · kingsA · dustB
- 2 A-A- unfulfilledA · done · spilledA · gone
- 3 ABAB everythingA · quarrelB · singA · laurelB
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 iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| As long as Fame's imperious music rings | 10 | ····˘/˘/˘· |
| Will poets mock it with crowned words august; | 10 | ·/˘·····/˘ |
| And haggard men will clamber to be kings | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| As long as Glory weighs itself in dust. | 10 | ···/˘·˘/·· |
| Drink to the splendor of the unfulfilled, | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| Nor shudder for the revels that are done: | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| The wines that flushed Lucullus are all spilled, | 10 | ·········· |
| The strings that Nero fingered are all gone. | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| We cannot crown ourselves with everything, | 10 | ·/˘·˘/·/˘· |
| Nor can we coax the Fates for us to quarrel: | 11 | ·········/˘ |
| No matter what we are, or what we sing, | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Time finds a withered leaf in every laurel. | 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.