Unwatch’d the garden bough shall sway
Unwatch’d the garden bough shall sway,The tender blossom flutter down,Unloved that beech will gather brown,This maple burn itself away;
Unloved, the sun-flower, shining fair,Ray round with flames her disk of seed,And many a rose-carnation feedWith summer spice the humming air;
Unloved, by many a sandy bar,The brook shall babble down the plain,At noon or when the lesser wainIs twisting round the polar star;
Uncared for, gird the windy grove,And flood the haunts of hern and crake;Or into silver arrows breakThe sailing moon in creek and cove;
Till from the garden and the wildA fresh association blow,And year by year the landscape growFamiliar to the stranger’s child;
As year by year the labourer tillsHis wonted glebe, or lops the glades;And year by year our memory fadesFrom all the circle of the hills.
Words in this poem
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- wain n.
- A four-wheeled vehicle for the transportation of goods, produce, etc.; a wagon. [OE. wain, AS. wægn; akin to D. & G. wagen, OHG. wagan, Icel. & Sw. vagn, Dan. vogn, and E. way. Way, Weigh, and cf. Wagon.]
- uncared a.
- Not cared for; not heeded; -- with for.
- hern n.
- A heron; esp., the common European heron.
- crake n.
- A boast. See Crack, n.
- cove v. t.
- To brood, cover, over, or sit over, as birds their eggs. [CF. F. couver, It. covare. See Covey.]
- wonted a.
- Accustomed; customary; usual.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Unwatch’d the garden bough shall sway 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, Unwatch’d the garden bough shall sway, in In Memoriam A.H.H. (1850), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #70950, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/tennyson-in-memoriam/section-99.html, id L18459.
Form and metre
Unwatch’d the garden bough shall sway is 24 lines in 6 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABBA. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 96%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.0 syllables. 29% 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 swayA · downB · brownB · awayA
- 2 ABBA fairA · seedB · feedB · airA
- 3 ABBA barA · plainB · wainB · starA
- 4 ABBA groveA · crakeB · breakB · coveA
- 5 ABBA wildA · blowB · growB · childA
- 6 ABBA tillsA · gladesB · fadesB · hillsA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Unwatch’d the garden bough shall sway, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The tender blossom flutter down, | 8 | ·/˘/˘/˘· |
| Unloved that beech will gather brown, | 8 | ˘/···/˘· |
| This maple burn itself away; | 8 | ·/˘·˘/˘/ |
| Unloved, the sun-flower, shining fair, | 8 | ˘/··//˘· |
| Ray round with flames her disk of seed, | 8 | ········ |
| And many a rose-carnation feed | 8 | ·/··˘/˘· |
| With summer spice the humming air; | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Unloved, by many a sandy bar, | 8 | ˘/·/·/˘· |
| The brook shall babble down the plain, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| At noon or when the lesser wain | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Is twisting round the polar star; | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Uncared for, gird the windy grove, | 8 | ˘/···/˘· |
| And flood the haunts of hern and crake; | 8 | ········ |
| Or into silver arrows break | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| The sailing moon in creek and cove; | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Till from the garden and the wild | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| A fresh association blow, | 8 | ··˘·˘/˘· |
| And year by year the landscape grow | 8 | ·····/·· |
| Familiar to the stranger’s child; | 8 | ˘/˘··/˘· |
| As year by year the labourer tills | 9 | ········· |
| His wonted glebe, or lops the glades; | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| And year by year our memory fades | 8 | ····//˘· |
| From all the circle of the hills. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
On this poem
Unwatched and unloved will the flowers in the garden bloom with their fragrance, although the family be gone: and the trees will put forth, and afterwards shed their foliage. The rose-carnation, too, will
"feed With summer-spice the humming air,"
in which the bees are busy.
Uncared for, the brook will babble
"At noon, or when the lesser wain Is twisting round the polar star;"--
also when the sailing moon's reflection in the water becomes broken into silver arrows.
All this will go on, until garden and wild become familiar to the succeeding stranger:
"And year by year our memory fades From all the circle of the hills."
Future generations will nevertheless visit Somersby, with something of the reverence that still attracts the stranger to Stratford-on-Avon.
Notes from the edition 8
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 1, line 3 ' beech ': cf. xxx. 9. [Bradley]
- Stanza 1, line 4 Cf. ii. u, xcix. 12. [Bradley]
- Stanza 2, line 4 Cf. LXXXIX. 52. [Bradley]
- Stanza 3 The brook. [The brook at Somersby, the charm and beauty of which was a joy to my father all his life. — ED.]
or when the lesser wain. [My father would often spend his nights wandering about the wolds, gazing at the stars. Edward Fitz- Gerald writes: " Like Wordsworth on the mountains, Alfred too, when a lad abroad on the wold, sometimes of a night with the
shepherd, watched not only the flock on the greensward, but also
the fleecy star that bears Andromeda far off Atlantic seas." Cf. Memoir, i. 19. — ED.] [Hallam Tennyson] - Stanza 3, line 1 The brook seems to have been an object of special affection. Cf. LXXIX. 9, 10, LXXXIX. 43-5, xcv. 7, xcix. 5, 6, C. 14-16. The present lines seem to be the germ of The Brook.
n, 12. * or when,' etc. The pole-star, one of the stars in the * lesser wain,' or ursa minor, forms the apparent axis of that constellation. The periphrasis seems needlessly elabo- rate, but it presumably recalls the boy's pleasure in watching
this constellation, with the sound of the unseen brook coming to h m from time to time. Collins quotes Sophocles, Track. 130, 3-pKTov (TTpo<t>d5es Kfrevdoi. Cf. Lay of the Last Minstrel, I. xv ii.:
Arthur's slow wain his course doth roll,
In utter darkness, round the pole. [Bradley] - Stanza 4, line 3 Cf. XLIX. 3, 4. [Bradley]
- Stanza 5, line 2 'blow,' like a flower. [Bradley]
- Stanza 6, line 1 'the labourer,' who does not move away, but belongs to the landscape. [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.