Sonnet
There was an Indian, who had known no change,Who strayed content along a sunlit beachGathering shells. He heard a sudden strangeCommingled noise; looked up; and gasped for speech.For in the bay, where nothing was before,Moved on the sea, by magic, huge canoes,With bellying cloths on poles, and not one oar,And fluttering coloured signs and clambering crews.
And he, in fear, this naked man alone,His fallen hands forgetting all their shells,His lips gone pale, knelt low behind a stone,And stared, and saw, and did not understand,Columbus's doom-burdened caravelsSlant to the shore, and all their seamen land.
Words in this poem
- sunlit a.
- Lighted by the sun.
- coloured a.
- Having color; tinged; dyed; painted; stained.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sonnet is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems - First Series, Project Gutenberg ebook #37860; 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 Collings Squire, Sonnet, in Poems: First Series (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #37860, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/squire-poems/sonnet.html, id L23195.
Form and metre
Sonnet is 14 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 84%).
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 ABABCDCD changeA · beachB · strangeA · speechB · beforeC · canoesD · oarC · crewsD
- 2 ABACBC aloneA · shellsB · stoneA · understandC · caravelsB · landC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| There was an Indian, who had known no change, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Who strayed content along a sunlit beach | 10 | ··˘/˘/·/·· |
| Gathering shells. He heard a sudden strange | 10 | /˘˘····/˘· |
| Commingled noise; looked up; and gasped for speech. | 10 | ˘/˘······· |
| For in the bay, where nothing was before, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Moved on the sea, by magic, huge canoes, | 10 | ·····/˘·˘/ |
| With bellying cloths on poles, and not one oar, | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| And fluttering coloured signs and clambering crews. | 10 | ·/˘/˘··/˘· |
| And he, in fear, this naked man alone, | 10 | ·····/˘·˘/ |
| His fallen hands forgetting all their shells, | 10 | ·/˘·˘/˘··· |
| His lips gone pale, knelt low behind a stone, | 10 | ·········· |
| And stared, and saw, and did not understand, | 10 | ········˘/ |
| Columbus's doom-burdened caravels | 10 | ˘/˘˘·/˘/˘· |
| Slant to the shore, and all their seamen land. | 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.