Haze
Woof of the sun, ethereal gauze,Woven of Nature’s richest stuffs,Visible heat, air-water, and dry sea,Last conquest of the eye;Toil of the day displayed, sun-dust,Aerial surf upon the shores of earth,Ethereal estuary, frith of light,Breakers of air, billows of heat,Fine summer spray on inland seas;Bird of the sun, transparent-winged,Owlet of noon, soft-pinioned,From heath or stubble rising without song,--Establish thy serenity o’er the fields.
Words in this poem
- frith n.
- A forest; a woody place. Drayton. [OE. frith peace, protection, land inclosed for hunting, park, forest, AS. fri peace; akin to freno peace, protection, asylum, G. friede peace, Icel. fri, and fr]
- owlet n.
- A small owl; especially, the European species (Athene noctua), and the California flammulated owlet (Megascops flammeolus). Owlet moth (Zoöl.), any noctuid moth. [Dim. of owl. Cf. Howlet.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Haze is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems of Nature, Project Gutenberg ebook #59988; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Henry David Thoreau, Haze, in Poems of Nature (1895), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #59988, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/thoreau-poems/haze.html, id L02819.
Form and metre
Haze is 13 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 84%). 94% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.5 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
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 --AA--------- gauze · stuffs · seaA · eyeA · dust · earth · light · heat · seas · winged · pinioned · song · fields
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Woof of the sun, ethereal gauze, | 8 | ····˘/˘· |
| Woven of Nature’s richest stuffs, | 8 | /˘·/˘/˘· |
| Visible heat, air-water, and dry sea, | 9 | /˘··/˘··· |
| Last conquest of the eye; | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Toil of the day displayed, sun-dust, | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| Aerial surf upon the shores of earth, | 9 | /˘······· |
| Ethereal estuary, frith of light, | 10 | ˘/˘/˘·˘··· |
| Breakers of air, billows of heat, | 8 | /˘··/˘·· |
| Fine summer spray on inland seas; | 8 | ·/˘··/·· |
| Bird of the sun, transparent-winged, | 8 | ····˘/˘· |
| Owlet of noon, soft-pinioned, | 8 | /˘···/˘˘ |
| From heath or stubble rising without song,-- | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Establish thy serenity o’er the fields. | 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.