Be near me when my light is low
Be near me when my light is low,When the blood creeps, and the nerves prickAnd tingle; and the heart is sick,And all the wheels of Being slow.
Be near me when the sensuous frameIs rack’d with pangs that conquer trust,And time, a maniac, scattering dust,And life, a Fury, slinging flame.
Be near me when my faith is dry,And men the flies of latter spring,That lay their eggs, and sting and sing,And weave their petty cells and die.
Be near me when I fade away,To point the term of human strife,And on the low dark verge of lifeThe twilight of eternal day.
Words in this poem
- tingle v. i.
- To feel a kind of thrilling sensation, as in hearing a shrill sound. [Freq. of ting. Cf. Tinkle.]
- sensuous a.
- Of or pertaining to the senses, or sensible objects; addressing the senses; suggesting pictures or images of sense.
- maniac a.
- Raving with madness; raging with disordered intellect; affected with mania; mad. [F. maniaque. See Mania.]
- strife n.
- The act of striving; earnest endeavor. [OF. estrif. See Strive.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Be near me when my light is low 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, Be near me when my light is low, in In Memoriam A.H.H. (1850), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #70950, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/tennyson-in-memoriam/section-49.html, id L18409.
Form and metre
Be near me when my light is low is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABBA. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 93%). 97% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.1 syllables. 19% 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 lowA · prickB · sickB · slowA
- 2 ABBA frameA · trustB · dustB · flameA
- 3 ABBA dryA · springB · singB · dieA
- 4 ABBA awayA · strifeB · lifeB · dayA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Be near me when my light is low, | 8 | ········ |
| When the blood creeps, and the nerves prick | 8 | ········ |
| And tingle; and the heart is sick, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| And all the wheels of Being slow. | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Be near me when the sensuous frame | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Is rack’d with pangs that conquer trust, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And time, a maniac, scattering dust, | 9 | ···/˘·/˘· |
| And life, a Fury, slinging flame. | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| Be near me when my faith is dry, | 8 | ········ |
| And men the flies of latter spring, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| That lay their eggs, and sting and sing, | 8 | ········ |
| And weave their petty cells and die. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Be near me when I fade away, | 8 | ······˘/ |
| To point the term of human strife, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And on the low dark verge of life | 8 | ········ |
| The twilight of eternal day. | 8 | ·/··˘/˘· |
On this poem
"Be near me when I fade away, To point the term of human strife, And on the low dark verge of life, The twilight of eternal day."
The idea is sustained, that we shall go through the darkness of death, when Time will be lost, into the dawning light of Eternity; and the Poet would have his friend be near him at this translation.
Notes from the edition 2
Section introductions from Alfred Gatty, <i>A Key to Lord Tennyson's “In Memoriam”</i>, 4th ed. (George Bell & Sons, 1900; Project Gutenberg #36637). Line notes credited “[Tennyson]” are Tennyson's own notes; “[Hallam Tennyson]” marks a note that is wholly his son and editor's own explanatory bracket, not the poet's own words; “[Emily Tennyson]” marks the few notes signed by his wife. All three are from <i>The Works of Tennyson, Annotated by the Author</i>, ed. Hallam, Lord Tennyson, vol. 3 (Macmillan, 1908; Internet Archive worksoftennysona03tennuoft). Line notes credited “[Bradley]” are A. C. Bradley's, from <i>A Commentary on Tennyson's In Memoriam</i> (Macmillan, 1910; Internet Archive commentaryontenn00braduoft). All these number sections by the final, 131-section text, not the site's own 1850 numbering: from final XL to LVIII subtract one section number, from LX on subtract two, to reach the site's; the site prints the 129-section first edition of 1850 (see the work's own blurb), so two of the final text's numbered sections have no home here and are skipped.
- Stanza 3, line 2 The summer-fly of Shakespeare and Milton (Samson^ 676).
II.': ting and sing.' The contemptuous rhyme is perhaps an unconscious reminiscence of Pope's couplet (Epistle to Dr. Ariuthnot^ 309):
Yel let me flap this bug with gilded wings, This painted child of dirt, that stinks and stings. [Bradley] - Stanza 4, line 2 'point the term': point to the limit.
15, 1 6 Cf. xcv. 63,64. [Bradley]
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.