Song: When Thou Thy Pliant Arms
When thou thy pliant arms dost wreatheAbout my neck, and gently breatheInto my breast that soft sweet airWith which thy soul doth mine repair;When my faint life thou draw'st away,(My life which scorching flames decay,)O'ercharg'd, my panting bosom boils,Whose fever thy kind art beguiles,And with the breath that did inspireDoth mildly fan my glowing fire.Transported, then I cry: 'AboveAll other deities is Love!Or if a deity there beGreater than Love, 'tis only thee.'
Words in this poem
- scorching a.
- Burning; parching or shriveling with heat.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Song: When Thou Thy Pliant Arms is in the public domain. This text is taken from Thomas Stanley: His Original Lyrics, Complete, In Their Collated Readings of 1647, 1651, 1657. With an Introduction, Textual Notes, a List of Editions, an Appendix of Translations, and a Portrait., Project Gutenberg ebook #32986; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Thomas Stanley, Song: When Thou Thy Pliant Arms, in Original Lyrics (1651), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #32986, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/stanley-lyrics/song-when-thou-thy-pliant-arms.html, id L09000.
Form and metre
Song: When Thou Thy Pliant Arms is 14 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 86% of the lines: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%). 93% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.1 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 43% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in octosyllabic couplets, other poems in iambic 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 AABBCC--DDEEFF wreatheA · breatheA · airB · repairB · awayC · decayC · boils · beguiles · inspireD · fireD · aboveE · loveE · beF · theeF
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| When thou thy pliant arms dost wreathe | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| About my neck, and gently breathe | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Into my breast that soft sweet air | 8 | ········ |
| With which thy soul doth mine repair; | 8 | ······˘/ |
| When my faint life thou draw'st away, | 8 | ······˘/ |
| (My life which scorching flames decay,) | 8 | ···/˘·˘/ |
| O'ercharg'd, my panting bosom boils, | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| Whose fever thy kind art beguiles, | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| And with the breath that did inspire | 8 | ······˘/ |
| Doth mildly fan my glowing fire. | 9 | ·/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Transported, then I cry: 'Above | 8 | ˘/˘····· |
| All other deities is Love! | 8 | ·/˘/˘˘·· |
| Or if a deity there be | 8 | ···/˘˘·· |
| Greater than Love, 'tis only thee.' | 8 | /˘···/˘· |
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.