On a Circle
I'm up and down, and round about,Yet all the world can't find me out;Though hundreds have employ'd their leisure,They never yet could find my measure.I'm found almost in every garden,Nay, in the compass of a farthing.There's neither chariot, coach, nor mill,Can move an inch except I will.
About this text
On a Circle is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #13621; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Jonathan Swift, On a Circle, in Poems, Volume II (1710–1745), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #13621, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/swift-poems/on-a-circle.html, id L09260.
Form and metre
On a Circle is 8 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 75% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.5 syllables. 4 lines end 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 AABB--CC aboutA · outA · leisureB · measureB · garden · farthing · millC · willC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I'm up and down, and round about, | 8 | ········ |
| Yet all the world can't find me out; | 8 | ········ |
| Though hundreds have employ'd their leisure, | 9 | ·/˘·˘/·/˘ |
| They never yet could find my measure. | 9 | ·/˘····/˘ |
| I'm found almost in every garden, | 9 | ··/··/˘/˘ |
| Nay, in the compass of a farthing. | 9 | ···/˘··/˘ |
| There's neither chariot, coach, nor mill, | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| Can move an inch except I will. | 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.