Fragment: 'When a Lover Clasps His Fairest'
When a lover clasps his fairest,Then be our dread sport the rarest.Their caresses were like the chaffIn the tempest, and be our laughHis despair--her epitaph!
When a mother clasps her child,Watch till dusty Death has piledHis cold ashes on the clay;She has loved it many a day--She remains,--it fades away.
Words in this poem
- piled a.
- Having a pile or point; pointed. [From 2d Pile.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Fragment: 'When a Lover Clasps His Fairest' is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley — Volume 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #4798; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Percy Bysshe Shelley, Fragment: 'When a Lover Clasps His Fairest', in The Complete Poetical Works, Volume II (1816–1819), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4798, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/shelley-later-poems/fragment-when-a-lover-clasps-his-fairest.html, id L16376.
Form and metre
Fragment: 'When a Lover Clasps His Fairest' is 10 lines in 2 stanzas of 5 lines each. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 84%). 92% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.8 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 30% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See 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 --AAA fairest · rarest · chaffA · laughA · epitaphA
- 2 AABBB childA · piledA · clayB · dayB · awayB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| When a lover clasps his fairest, | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| Then be our dread sport the rarest. | 9 | ··/˘···/˘ |
| Their caresses were like the chaff | 8 | ·˘/˘···· |
| In the tempest, and be our laugh | 9 | ··/˘··/˘· |
| His despair--her epitaph! | 7 | ·˘/·/˘· |
| When a mother clasps her child, | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Watch till dusty Death has piled | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| His cold ashes on the clay; | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| She has loved it many a day-- | 9 | ···˘·/˘·· |
| She remains,--it fades away. | 7 | ·˘/··˘/ |
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.