II the Song of Tel the Nubian
Small dazzling face!I shut you in my soul;How can I perish now?
But thence a strange decay—Your fragile gleaming wristsWaver my days and shake my lifeTo golden tremors. I have no life at all,Only thin golden tremorsThat shudder over the abyss of daysWhich hedged my spirit, my spirit your prison wallsThat shrunk like phantasms with your vivid beauty—
Towering and widening tillThe sad moonless placeThrongs with a million torchesAnd spears of flaming wings.
Words in this poem
- waver v. i.
- To play or move to and fro; to move one way and the other; hence, to totter; to reel; to swing; to flutter. [OE. waveren, from AS. wæfre wavering, restless. See Wave, v. i.]
- towering a.
- Very high; elevated; rising aloft; as, a towering height.
- moonless a.
- Being without a moon or moonlight.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
II the Song of Tel the Nubian is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems by Isaac Rosenberg, Project Gutenberg ebook #66889; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Isaac Rosenberg, II the Song of Tel the Nubian, in Poems (1922), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #66889, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/rosenberg-poems/ii-the-song-of-tel-the-nubian.html, id L02506.
Form and metre
II the Song of Tel the Nubian is 15 lines in 3 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 84%). 89% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.3 syllables. 3 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 53% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic 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.
- 2 ----AA-- decay · wrists · life · all · tremorsA · daysA · walls · beauty
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Small dazzling face! | 5 | ·/˘˘· |
| I shut you in my soul; | 6 | ······ |
| How can I perish now? | 6 | ···/˘· |
| But thence a strange decay— | 6 | ····˘/ |
| Your fragile gleaming wrists | 6 | ·/˘/˘· |
| Waver my days and shake my life | 8 | /˘······ |
| To golden tremors. I have no life at all, | 11 | ·/˘/˘······ |
| Only thin golden tremors | 7 | /˘·/˘/˘ |
| That shudder over the abyss of days | 9 | ·/˘··˘/·· |
| Which hedged my spirit, my spirit your prison walls | 10 | ···/·/·/˘· |
| That shrunk like phantasms with your vivid beauty— | 12 | ····/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Towering and widening till | 6 | /˘·/˘· |
| The sad moonless place | 5 | ··/˘· |
| Throngs with a million torches | 7 | ···/˘/˘ |
| And spears of flaming wings. | 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.