I cannot love thee as I ought
I cannot love thee as I ought,For love reflects the thing beloved;My words are only words, and movedUpon the topmost froth of thought.
‘Yet blame not thou thy plaintive song,’The Spirit of true love replied;‘Thou canst not move me from thy side,Nor human frailty do me wrong.
‘What keeps a spirit wholly trueTo that ideal which he bears?What record? not the sinless yearsThat breathed beneath the Syrian blue;
‘So fret not, like an idle girl,That life is dash’d with flecks of sin.Abide: thy wealth is gathered in,When Time hath sunder’d shell from pearl.’
Words in this poem
- ought p. p.
- Was or were under obligation to pay; owed. [Orig. the preterit of the verb to owe. OE. oughte, aughte, ahte, AS. ahte. sq. root110. See Owe.]
- frailty n.
- The condition quality of being frail, physically, mentally, or morally, frailness; infirmity; weakness of resolution; liableness to be deceived or seduced. [OE. frelete, freilte, OF. fraileté, fr. L. fragilitas. See Frail, a., and cf. Fragility.]
- sinless a.
- Free from sin. Piers Plowman.
- wealth n.
- Weal; welfare; prosperity; good. [OE. welthe, from wele; cf. D. weelde luxury. See Weal prosperity.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
I cannot love thee as I ought 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, I cannot love thee as I ought, in In Memoriam A.H.H. (1850), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #70950, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/tennyson-in-memoriam/section-51.html, id L18411.
Form and metre
I cannot love thee as I ought 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%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.9 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 oughtA · belovedB · movedB · thoughtA
- 2 ABBA songA · repliedB · sideB · wrongA
- 3 ABBA trueA · bearsB · yearsB · blueA
- 4 ABBA girlA · sinB · inB · pearlA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I cannot love thee as I ought, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| For love reflects the thing beloved; | 8 | ··˘/··˘/ |
| My words are only words, and moved | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Upon the topmost froth of thought. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| ‘Yet blame not thou thy plaintive song,’ | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| The Spirit of true love replied; | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| ‘Thou canst not move me from thy side, | 8 | ········ |
| Nor human frailty do me wrong. | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| ‘What keeps a spirit wholly true | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| To that ideal which he bears? | 7 | ··˘/··· |
| What record? not the sinless years | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| That breathed beneath the Syrian blue; | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| ‘So fret not, like an idle girl, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| That life is dash’d with flecks of sin. | 8 | ········ |
| Abide: thy wealth is gathered in, | 8 | ˘/···/˘· |
| When Time hath sunder’d shell from pearl.’ | 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.