Doors, where my heart was used to beat
Doors, where my heart was used to beatSo quickly, not as one that weepsI come once more; the city sleeps;I smell the meadow in the street;
I hear a chirp of birds; I seeBetwixt the black fronts long-withdrawnA light-blue lane of early dawn,And think of early days and thee,
And bless thee, for thy lips are blandAnd bright the friendship of thine eye;And in my thoughts with scarce a sighI take the pressure of thine hand.
Words in this poem
- betwixt prep.
- In the space which separates; between. [OE. betwix, bitwix, rarely bitwixt, AS. betweox, betweohs, betweoh, betwih; pref. be- by + a form fr. AS. twa two. See Between.]
- scarce a.
- Not plentiful or abundant; in small quantity in proportion to the demand; not easily to be procured; rare; uncommon. [OE. scars, OF. escars, eschars, LL. scarpsus, for L. excerptus, p. p. of excerpere to pick out, and hence to contract, to shorten; ex (see Ex-) + carpere. See C]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Doors, where my heart was used to beat is in the public domain. This text is taken from In memoriam, Project Gutenberg ebook #70950; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Alfred Tennyson, Doors, where my heart was used to beat, in In Memoriam A.H.H. (1850), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #70950, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/tennyson-in-memoriam/section-117.html, id L18477.
Form and metre
Doors, where my heart was used to beat is 12 lines in 3 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABBA. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.0 syllables. 50% 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 ABBA beatA · weepsB · sleepsB · streetA
- 2 ABBA seeA · withdrawnB · dawnB · theeA
- 3 ABBA blandA · eyeB · sighB · handA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Doors, where my heart was used to beat | 8 | ········ |
| So quickly, not as one that weeps | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| I come once more; the city sleeps; | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| I smell the meadow in the street; | 8 | ···/···· |
| I hear a chirp of birds; I see | 8 | ········ |
| Betwixt the black fronts long-withdrawn | 8 | ˘/····˘/ |
| A light-blue lane of early dawn, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And think of early days and thee, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And bless thee, for thy lips are bland | 8 | ········ |
| And bright the friendship of thine eye; | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And in my thoughts with scarce a sigh | 8 | ········ |
| I take the pressure of thine hand. | 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.