Lost on Both Sides
As when two men have loved a woman well,Each hating each, through Love's and Death's deceit;Since not for either this stark marriage-sheetAnd the long pauses of this wedding bell;Yet o'er her grave the night and day dispelAt last their feud forlorn, with cold and heat;Nor other than dear friends to death may fleetThe two lives left that most of her can tell:--
So separate hopes, which in a soul had wooedThe one same Peace, strove with each other long,And Peace before their faces perished since:So through that soul, in restless brotherhood,They roam together now, and wind amongIts bye-streets, knocking at the dusty inns.
Words in this poem
- stark adv.
- Wholly; entirely; absolutely; quite; as, stark mind.
- dispel v. t.
- To drive away by scattering, or so to cause to vanish; to clear away; to banish; to dissipate; as, to dispel a cloud, vapors, cares, doubts, illusions. [L. dispellere; dis- + pellere to push, drive. See Pulse a beating.]
- forlorn a.
- Deserted abandoned; lost. [OE., p.p. of forlesen to lose utterly, AS. forleósan (p.p. forloren); pref. for- + leósan (in comp.) to lose; cf. D. verliezen to lose, G. verlieren, Sw. förlor]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Lost on Both Sides is in the public domain. This text is taken from The House of Life, Project Gutenberg ebook #3692; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Lost on Both Sides, in The House of Life (1881), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #3692, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/rossetti-house-of-life/lost-on-both-sides.html, id L21007.
Form and metre
Lost on Both Sides is 14 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%).
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 ABBAABBA wellA · deceitB · sheetB · bellA · dispelA · heatB · fleetB · tellA
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 when two men have loved a woman well, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Each hating each, through Love's and Death's deceit; | 10 | ·/˘·····˘/ |
| Since not for either this stark marriage-sheet | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| And the long pauses of this wedding bell; | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Yet o'er her grave the night and day dispel | 10 | ········˘/ |
| At last their feud forlorn, with cold and heat; | 10 | ····˘/···· |
| Nor other than dear friends to death may fleet | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| The two lives left that most of her can tell:-- | 10 | ·········· |
| So separate hopes, which in a soul had wooed | 11 | ·/˘········ |
| The one same Peace, strove with each other long, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| And Peace before their faces perished since: | 10 | ·····/˘/˘· |
| So through that soul, in restless brotherhood, | 10 | ·····/˘/˘· |
| They roam together now, and wind among | 10 | ··˘/˘····· |
| Its bye-streets, knocking at the dusty inns. | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
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.