Swans
Night is over the park, and a few brave starsLook on the lights that link it with chains of gold,The lake bears up their reflection in broken barsThat seem too heavy for tremulous water to hold.
We watch the swans that sleep in a shadowy place,And now and again one wakes and uplifts its head;How still you are--your gaze is on my face--We watch the swans and never a word is said.
About this text
Swans is in the public domain. This text is taken from Love Songs, Project Gutenberg ebook #442; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Sara Teasdale, Swans, in Love Songs (1917), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #442, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/teasdale-love-songs/swans.html, id L08059.
Form and metre
Swans is 8 lines in 2 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABAB. 91% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 11.0 syllables. 25% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 ABAB starsA · goldB · barsA · holdB
- 2 ABAB placeA · headB · faceA · saidB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Night is over the park, and a few brave stars | 10 | ·········· |
| Look on the lights that link it with chains of gold, | 11 | ··········· |
| The lake bears up their reflection in broken bars | 12 | ·····˘/˘·/˘· |
| That seem too heavy for tremulous water to hold. | 12 | ···/˘·/˘/˘·· |
| We watch the swans that sleep in a shadowy place, | 11 | ········/˘· |
| And now and again one wakes and uplifts its head; | 12 | ···˘/···/˘·· |
| How still you are--your gaze is on my face-- | 10 | ·········· |
| We watch the swans and never a word is said. | 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.