Within the Veil
She holds a lily in her hand,Where long ranks of Angels stand,A silver lily for her wand.
All her hair falls sweeping down;Her hair that is a golden brown,A crown beneath her golden crown.
Blooms a rose-bush at her knee,Good to smell and good to see:It bears a rose for her, for me;
Her rose a blossom richly grown,My rose a bud not fully blown,But sure one day to be mine own.
About this text
Within the Veil is in the public domain. This text is taken from Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #16950; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Christina Rossetti, Within the Veil, in Goblin Market and Other Poems (1862), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #16950, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/rossetti-goblin-market/within-the-veil.html, id L04365.
Form and metre
Within the Veil is 12 lines in 4 stanzas of 3 lines each. It is in rhyming couplets, 67% of the lines: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 94%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.7 syllables.
See other poems in octosyllabic couplets, other poems in iambic tetrameter.
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 AA- handA · standA · wand
- 2 AAA downA · brownA · crownA
- 3 AAA kneeA · seeA · meA
- 4 AAA grownA · blownA · ownA
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| She holds a lily in her hand, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Where long ranks of Angels stand, | 7 | ····/˘· |
| A silver lily for her wand. | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| All her hair falls sweeping down; | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Her hair that is a golden brown, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| A crown beneath her golden crown. | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Blooms a rose-bush at her knee, | 7 | ······· |
| Good to smell and good to see: | 7 | ······· |
| It bears a rose for her, for me; | 8 | ········ |
| Her rose a blossom richly grown, | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| My rose a bud not fully blown, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| But sure one day to be mine own. | 8 | ········ |
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.