Sonnet 33
I might, unhappy word, (woe me) I might,And then would not, nor could not see my blisse:Till now, wrapt in a most infernall Night,I finde, how heavenly day (wretch) did I misse;Hart rent thy selfe, thou doost thy selfe but right.No lovely Paris made thy Helen his,No force, no fraude, robd thee of thy delight,Nor fortune of thy fortune Author is;But to my selfe, my selfe did give the blow,While too much wit forsooth so trubled me,That I respects for both our sakes must show,And yet could not by rysing morne fore-see,How faire a day was neere, (ô punisht eyes)That I had beene more foolish, or more wise.
Words in this poem
- infernall a.
- Of or pertaining to or suitable for the lower regions, inhabited, according to the ancients, by the dead; pertaining to Pluto's realm of the dead, the Tartarus of the ancients. [F. infernal, L. infernalis, fr. infernus that which lies beneath, the lower. See Inferior.]
- forsooth v. t.
- To address respectfully with the term forsooth.
- morne a.
- Of or pertaining to the morn; morning.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sonnet 33 is in the public domain. This text is taken from Sir P.S.: His Astrophel and Stella Wherein the excellence of sweete poesie is concluded, Project Gutenberg ebook #56375; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Philip Sidney, Sonnet 33, in Astrophel and Stella (1591), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #56375, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/sidney-astrophel/sonnet-33.html, id L04789.
Form and metre
Sonnet 33 is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABABACACDEDEFF. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.0 syllables.
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 ABABACACDEDEFF mightA · blisseB · nightA · misseB · rightA · hisC · delightA · isC · blowD · meE · showD · seeE · eyesF · wiseF
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I might, unhappy word, (woe me) I might, | 10 | ··˘/˘····· |
| And then would not, nor could not see my blisse: | 10 | ·········· |
| Till now, wrapt in a most infernall Night, | 10 | ······˘/˘· |
| I finde, how heavenly day (wretch) did I misse; | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Hart rent thy selfe, thou doost thy selfe but right. | 10 | ·········· |
| No lovely Paris made thy Helen his, | 10 | ·/˘/˘··/˘· |
| No force, no fraude, robd thee of thy delight, | 10 | ········˘/ |
| Nor fortune of thy fortune Author is; | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/˘· |
| But to my selfe, my selfe did give the blow, | 10 | ·········· |
| While too much wit forsooth so trubled me, | 10 | ····˘/··˘· |
| That I respects for both our sakes must show, | 10 | ··˘/··/··· |
| And yet could not by rysing morne fore-see, | 11 | ·······/˘·· |
| How faire a day was neere, (ô punisht eyes) | 9 | ········· |
| That I had beene more foolish, or more wise. | 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.