Poeta Skelton to Maister Gower
Maister Gower, I haue nothyng deseruedTo haue so laudabyle a commendacion:To yow thre this honor shalbe reserued,Arrectinge vnto your wyse examinacionHow all that I do is vnder refformation,For only the substance of that I entend,Is glad to please, and loth to offend.
Words in this poem
- maister n.
- Master. Chaucer.
- entend v. i.
- To attend to; to apply one's self to. [F. entendre, fr. L. intendere. See Intend.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Poeta Skelton to Maister Gower is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poetical Works of John Skelton, Volume 1 (of 2), Project Gutenberg ebook #59997; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: John Skelton, Poeta Skelton to Maister Gower, in Poetical Works, Volume I (1500–1529), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #59997, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/skelton-poems/poeta-skelton-to-maister-gower.html, id L08693.
Form and metre
Poeta Skelton to Maister Gower is 7 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 57% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 78%). 95% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.6 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
See other poems in heroic couplets, 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 ABABBCC deseruedA · commendacionB · reseruedA · examinacionB · refformationB · entendC · offendC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Maister Gower, I haue nothyng deserued | 10 | /˘/˘······ |
| To haue so laudabyle a commendacion: | 12 | ············ |
| To yow thre this honor shalbe reserued, | 10 | ····/˘···˘ |
| Arrectinge vnto your wyse examinacion | 11 | ··········· |
| How all that I do is vnder refformation, | 11 | ··········· |
| For only the substance of that I entend, | 11 | ·/˘·/˘···˘/ |
| Is glad to please, and loth to offend. | 9 | ·······˘/ |
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.