To the Roaring Wind
What syllable are you seeking,Vocalissimus,In the distances of sleep?Speak it.
About this text
To the Roaring Wind is in the public domain. This text is taken from Harmonium, Project Gutenberg ebook #78743; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Wallace Stevens, To the Roaring Wind, in Harmonium (1923), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #78743, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/stevens-harmonium/to-the-roaring-wind.html, id L01087.
Form and metre
To the Roaring Wind is 4 lines in a single stanza. The lines average 5.5 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
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.
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| What syllable are you seeking, | 8 | ·/˘˘··/˘ |
| Vocalissimus, | 5 | ····· |
| In the distances of sleep? | 7 | ··/˘˘·· |
| Speak it. | 2 | ·· |
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.