Song of Proserpine While Gathering Flowers on the Plain of Enna
Sacred Goddess, Mother Earth,Thou from whose immortal bosomGods, and men, and beasts have birth,Leaf and blade, and bud and blossom,Breathe thine influence most divineOn thine own child, Proserpine.
If with mists of evening dewThou dost nourish these young flowersTill they grow, in scent and hue,Fairest children of the Hours,Breathe thine influence most divineOn thine own child, Proserpine.
About this text
Song of Proserpine While Gathering Flowers on the Plain of Enna 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, Song of Proserpine While Gathering Flowers on the Plain of Enna, in The Complete Poetical Works, Volume II (1816–1819), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4798, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/shelley-later-poems/song-of-proserpine-while-gathering-flowers-on-the-plain-of-e.html, id L16396.
Form and metre
Song of Proserpine While Gathering Flowers on the Plain of Enna is 12 lines in 2 stanzas of 6 lines each. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%). 93% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.5 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 42% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in trochaic 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 A-A-BB earthA · bosom · birthA · blossom · divineB · proserpineB
- 2 ABABCC dewA · flowersB · hueA · hoursB · divineC · proserpineC
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 trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Sacred Goddess, Mother Earth, | 7 | /˘/˘/˘· |
| Thou from whose immortal bosom | 8 | ···˘/˘/˘ |
| Gods, and men, and beasts have birth, | 7 | ······· |
| Leaf and blade, and bud and blossom, | 8 | ······/˘ |
| Breathe thine influence most divine | 8 | ··/˘˘·˘/ |
| On thine own child, Proserpine. | 7 | ······· |
| If with mists of evening dew | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Thou dost nourish these young flowers | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| Till they grow, in scent and hue, | 7 | ······· |
| Fairest children of the Hours, | 8 | /˘/˘··/˘ |
| Breathe thine influence most divine | 8 | ··/˘˘·˘/ |
| On thine own child, Proserpine. | 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.