To --. 'Yet look on me'
Yet look on me--take not thine eyes away,Which feed upon the love within mine own,Which is indeed but the reflected rayOf thine own beauty from my spirit thrown.Yet speak to me--thy voice is as the toneOf my heart's echo, and I think I hearThat thou yet lovest me; yet thou aloneLike one before a mirror, without careOf aught but thine own features, imaged there;
And yet I wear out life in watching thee;A toil so sweet at times, and thou indeedArt kind when I am sick, and pity me...
Words in this poem
- aught n.
- Property; possession. [AS. , fr. agan to own, p. p. ahte.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
To --. 'Yet look on me' 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, To --. 'Yet look on me', in Ode to the West Wind, and Other Poems (1816–1819), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4798, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/shelley-later-poems/to-yet-look-on-me.html, id L25642.
Form and metre
To --. 'Yet look on me' is 12 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%).
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 ABABBCBCC awayA · ownB · rayA · thrownB · toneB · hearC · aloneB · careC · thereC
- 2 A-A theeA · indeed · meA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Yet look on me--take not thine eyes away, | 10 | ········˘/ |
| Which feed upon the love within mine own, | 10 | ·········· |
| Which is indeed but the reflected ray | 10 | ··˘/··˘/˘· |
| Of thine own beauty from my spirit thrown. | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Yet speak to me--thy voice is as the tone | 10 | ·········· |
| Of my heart's echo, and I think I hear | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| That thou yet lovest me; yet thou alone | 10 | ········˘/ |
| Like one before a mirror, without care | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Of aught but thine own features, imaged there; | 10 | ·····/˘/˘· |
| And yet I wear out life in watching thee; | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| A toil so sweet at times, and thou indeed | 10 | ········˘/ |
| Art kind when I am sick, and pity me... | 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.