Chapter III: On Lovers Sacrificing Themselves
While yielding his life up, a thirsty one cried:"Oh happy's the man who in cool water died!""Oh strange !" a raw youth, in reply to him, said ;"What are water and lips that are dry, when you're dead?"He replied, "I, at least, will not moisten my lips,That for Him my dear life may experience eclipse."One, thirsty, will into a deep cistern bound,For he knows he'll die sated with water, if drowned.If you are a lover, His skirt you should seize !If He asks for your life, say, "'Tis Yours when You please!"Your body in Paradise, happy, will dwell,When you cross safely over nonentity's hell.The hearts of the sowers of seed are distressed ;But when harvest arrives, they in happiness rest.In this meeting, the person his object has found,Who gets hold of the cup at the finishing round.
Words in this poem
- dwell v. i.
- To delay; to linger. [OE. dwellen, dwelien, to err, linger, AS. dwellan to deceive, hinder, delay, dwelian to err; akin to Icel. dvelja to delay, tarry, Sw. dväljas to dwell, Dan. dv]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Chapter III: On Lovers Sacrificing Themselves is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Garden of Fragrance: being a complete translation of the Bostan of Sadi from the original Persian into English verse, by G. S. Davie (London: Kegan Paul, Trench and Co., 1882), Internet Archive, the G. S. Davie translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Saadi, Chapter III: On Lovers Sacrificing Themselves, in The Garden of Fragrance (1882), text of Internet Archive, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/saadi-bostan/3-7.html, id L29599.
Form and metre
Chapter III: On Lovers Sacrificing Themselves is 16 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets. The metre is anapaestic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 94%).
See other poems in rhyming couplets, other poems in anapaestic 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 AABBCCDDEEFFGGDD criedA · diedA · saidB · deadB · lipsC · eclipseC · boundD · drownedD · seizeE · pleaseE · dwellF · hellF · distressedG · restG · foundD · roundD
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 anapaestic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| While yielding his life up, a thirsty one cried: | 11 | ·/˘····/˘·· |
| "Oh happy's the man who in cool water died!" | 11 | ·/˘·····/˘· |
| "Oh strange !" a raw youth, in reply to him, said ; | 11 | ······˘/··· |
| "What are water and lips that are dry, when you're dead?" | 12 | ··/˘········ |
| He replied, "I, at least, will not moisten my lips, | 12 | ·˘/·····/˘·· |
| That for Him my dear life may experience eclipse." | 12 | ·······˘/˘˘/ |
| One, thirsty, will into a deep cistern bound, | 11 | ·/˘·····/˘· |
| For he knows he'll die sated with water, if drowned. | 12 | ·····/˘·/˘·· |
| If you are a lover, His skirt you should seize ! | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| If He asks for your life, say, "'Tis Yours when You please!" | 12 | ············ |
| Your body in Paradise, happy, will dwell, | 11 | ·/˘·/˘·/˘·· |
| When you cross safely over nonentity's hell. | 12 | ···/˘··˘/˘˘· |
| The hearts of the sowers of seed are distressed ; | 12 | ····/˘···˘/˘ |
| But when harvest arrives, they in happiness rest. | 12 | ··/˘˘/··/˘˘· |
| In this meeting, the person his object has found, | 12 | ··/˘·/˘·/˘·· |
| Who gets hold of the cup at the finishing round. | 12 | ········/˘˘· |
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.