Pride of Youth
Even as a child, of sorrow that we giveThe dead, but little in his heart can find,Since without need of thought to his clear mindTheir turn it is to die and his to live:Even so the winged New Love smiles to receiveAlong his eddying plumes the auroral wind,Nor, forward glorying, casts one look behindWhere night-rack shrouds the Old Love fugitive.
There is a change in every hour's recall,And the last cowslip in the fields we seeOn the same day with the first corn-poppy.Alas for hourly change! Alas for allThe loves that from his hand proud Youth lets fall,Even as the beads of a told rosary!
Words in this poem
- auroral a.
- Belonging to, or resembling, the aurora (the dawn or the northern lights); rosy.
- cowslip n.
- A common flower in England (Primula veris) having yellow blossoms and appearing in early spring. It is often cultivated in the United States. [AS. c, c, prob. orig., cow's droppings. Cf. Slop, n.]
- hourly a.
- Happening or done every hour; occurring hour by hour; frequent; often repeated; renewed hour by hour; continual.
- rosary n.
- A bed of roses, or place where roses grow. [LL. rosarium a string of beads, L. rosarium a place planted with roses, rosa a rose: cf. F. rosaire. See Rose.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Pride of Youth 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, Pride of Youth, in The House of Life (1881), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #3692, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/rossetti-house-of-life/pride-of-youth.html, id L20944.
Form and metre
Pride of Youth is 14 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 79%).
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 ABBA-BBA giveA · findB · mindB · liveA · receive · windB · behindB · fugitiveA
- 2 A--AA- recallA · see · poppy · allA · fallA · rosary
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Even as a child, of sorrow that we give | 10 | /····/˘··· |
| The dead, but little in his heart can find, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Since without need of thought to his clear mind | 10 | ·········· |
| Their turn it is to die and his to live: | 10 | ·········· |
| Even so the winged New Love smiles to receive | 10 | /·······˘/ |
| Along his eddying plumes the auroral wind, | 11 | ˘/·/˘··˘/˘· |
| Nor, forward glorying, casts one look behind | 10 | ·/˘/˘····· |
| Where night-rack shrouds the Old Love fugitive. | 10 | ·······/˘˘ |
| There is a change in every hour's recall, | 10 | ·····/˘/˘/ |
| And the last cowslip in the fields we see | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| On the same day with the first corn-poppy. | 10 | ········/˘ |
| Alas for hourly change! Alas for all | 10 | ˘/·/˘·˘/·· |
| The loves that from his hand proud Youth lets fall, | 10 | ·········· |
| Even as the beads of a told rosary! | 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.