Premonition
The muffled syllables that Nature speaksFill us with deeper longing for her word;She hides a meaning that the spirit seeks,She makes a sweeter music than is heard.
A hidden light illumines all our seeing,An unknown love enchants our solitude.We feel and know that from the depths of beingExhales an infinite, a perfect good.
Though the heart wear the garment of its sorrowAnd be not happy like a naked star,Yet from the thought of peace some peace we borrow,Some rapture from the rapture felt afar.
Our heart strings are too coarse for Nature's fingersDeftly to quicken as she pulses on,And the harsh tremor that among them lingersWill into sweeter silence die anon.
We catch the broken prelude and suggestionOf things unuttered, needing to be sung;We know the burden of them, and their questionLies heavy on the heart, nor finds a tongue.
Till haply, lightning through the storm of ages,Our sullen secret flash from sky to sky,Glowing in some diviner poet's pagesAnd swelling into rapture from this sigh.
Words in this poem
- borrow v. t.
- To receive from another as a loan, with the implied or expressed intention of returning the identical article or its equivalent in kind; -- the opposite of lend. [OE. borwen, AS. borgian, fr. borg, borh, pledge; akin to D. borg, G. borg; prob. fr. root of AS. beorgan to protect. Borough.]
- afar adv.
- At, to, or from a great distance; far away; -- often used with from preceding, or off following; as, he was seen from afar; I saw him afar off. [Pref. a-.(for on or of) + far.]
- deftly adv.
- Aptly; fitly; dexterously; neatly. [Cf. Defly.]
- anon adv.
- Straightway; at once. [OE. anoon, anon, anan, lit., in one (moment), fr. AS. on in + an one. See On and One.]
- haply adv.
- By hap, chance, luck, or accident; perhaps; it may be.
- sullen a.
- Lonely; solitary; desolate. Wyclif (Job iii. 14). [OE. solein, solain, lonely, sullen; through Old French fr. (assumed) LL. solanus solitary, fr. L. solus alone. See Sole, a.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Premonition is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #49721; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: George Santayana, Premonition, in Poems (1922), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #49721, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/santayana-poems/premonition.html, id L21741.
Form and metre
Premonition is 24 lines in 6 stanzas of 4 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABAB, complete in 3 of its 6 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
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 ABAB speaksA · wordB · seeksA · heardB
- 2 A-A- seeingA · solitude · beingA · good
- 3 -A-A sorrow · starA · borrow · afarA
- 4 A-A- fingersA · on · lingersA · anon
- 5 ABAB suggestionA · sungB · questionA · tongueB
- 6 ABAB agesA · skyB · pagesA · sighB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| The muffled syllables that Nature speaks | 10 | ·/˘/˘˘·/˘· |
| Fill us with deeper longing for her word; | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| She hides a meaning that the spirit seeks, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| She makes a sweeter music than is heard. | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| A hidden light illumines all our seeing, | 11 | ·/˘·····//˘ |
| An unknown love enchants our solitude. | 10 | ·˘/·˘///˘· |
| We feel and know that from the depths of being | 11 | ·········/˘ |
| Exhales an infinite, a perfect good. | 10 | ˘/·/˘˘·/·· |
| Though the heart wear the garment of its sorrow | 11 | ·····/˘··/˘ |
| And be not happy like a naked star, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Yet from the thought of peace some peace we borrow, | 11 | ·········/· |
| Some rapture from the rapture felt afar. | 10 | ·/˘··/˘·˘/ |
| Our heart strings are too coarse for Nature's fingers | 11 | /······/˘/˘ |
| Deftly to quicken as she pulses on, | 10 | /˘·/˘··/˘· |
| And the harsh tremor that among them lingers | 11 | ···/˘····/˘ |
| Will into sweeter silence die anon. | 10 | ···/˘/˘·˘/ |
| We catch the broken prelude and suggestion | 11 | ···/˘/··˘/˘ |
| Of things unuttered, needing to be sung; | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| We know the burden of them, and their question | 11 | ···/˘····/˘ |
| Lies heavy on the heart, nor finds a tongue. | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Till haply, lightning through the storm of ages, | 11 | ·/˘/˘····/˘ |
| Our sullen secret flash from sky to sky, | 10 | //˘/˘····· |
| Glowing in some diviner poet's pages | 11 | /˘··˘/˘/˘/˘ |
| And swelling into rapture from this sigh. | 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.