Prelude
A wind and a voice from the North!A courier-wind sent forthFrom the mountains to the sea:A summons borne to meFrom halls which the Muses haunt, from hills where the heart and thewind are free!
“Come from the outer throng!”(Such was the burden it bore,)“Thou who hast gone before,Hither! and sing us a song,Far from the round of the town and the sound of the great world’s roar!”
O masterful voice of Youth;That will have, like the upland wind, its own wild way!O choral words, that with every season riseLike the warblings of orchard-birds at break of day!O faces, fresh with the light of morning skies!
No marvel world-worn toilers seek you here,Even as they life renew, from year to year,In woods and meadows lit with blossoming May;But O, blithe voices, that have such sweet power,Unto your high behest this summer hourWhat answer has the poet? how shall he frame his lay?
Words in this poem
- hast
- , 2d pers. sing. pres. of. Fave, contr. of havest.
- masterful a.
- Inclined to play the master; domineering; imperious; arbitrary.
- choral a.
- Of or pertaining to a choir or chorus; singing, sung, or adapted to be sung, in chorus or harmony. Choral service, a service of song. [LL. choralis, fr. L. chorus. See Chorus.]
- blithe a.
- Gay; merry; sprightly; joyous; glad; cheerful; as, a blithe spirit. [AS. bli blithe, kind; akin to Goth. blei kind, Icel. bli mild, gentle, Dan. & Sw. blid gentle, D. blijd blithe, OHG. blidi kind, blithe.]
- behest v. t.
- To vow. Paston.
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Prelude is in the public domain. This text is taken from The poetical works of Edmund Clarence Stedman, Project Gutenberg ebook #70763; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Edmund Clarence Stedman, Prelude, in The Poetical Works of Edmund Clarence Stedman (1860–1897), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #70763, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/stedman-poems/prelude-2.html, id L10728.
Form and metre
Prelude is 22 lines in 4 stanzas. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic tetrameter. 90% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.3 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 23% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See 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 AABBBB northA · forthA · seaB · meB · theB · freeB
- 2 ABBAB throngA · boreB · beforeB · songA · roarB
- 3 -ABAB youth · wayA · riseB · dayA · skiesB
- 4 AABCCB hereA · yearA · mayB · powerC · hourC · layB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| A wind and a voice from the North! | 8 | ········ |
| A courier-wind sent forth | 7 | ·/˘˘··· |
| From the mountains to the sea: | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| A summons borne to me | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| From halls which the Muses haunt, from hills where the heart and the | 14 | ····/˘········ |
| wind are free! | 3 | ··· |
| “Come from the outer throng!” | 6 | ···/˘· |
| (Such was the burden it bore,) | 7 | ···/˘·· |
| “Thou who hast gone before, | 6 | ······ |
| Hither! and sing us a song, | 7 | /˘····· |
| Far from the round of the town and the sound of the great world’s roar!” | 15 | ··············· |
| O masterful voice of Youth; | 7 | ·/˘˘··· |
| That will have, like the upland wind, its own wild way! | 12 | ·····/˘····· |
| O choral words, that with every season rise | 11 | ·/˘···/˘/˘· |
| Like the warblings of orchard-birds at break of day! | 12 | ··/˘·/˘····· |
| O faces, fresh with the light of morning skies! | 11 | ·/˘·····/˘· |
| No marvel world-worn toilers seek you here, | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Even as they life renew, from year to year, | 10 | /···˘/···· |
| In woods and meadows lit with blossoming May; | 10 | ···/···/˘· |
| But O, blithe voices, that have such sweet power, | 11 | ···/˘····/˘ |
| Unto your high behest this summer hour | 11 | ····˘/·/˘/˘ |
| What answer has the poet? how shall he frame his lay? | 13 | ·/˘··/˘······ |
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.