Mare Liberum
You dare to say with perjured lips,"We fight to make the ocean free"?You, whose black trail of butchered shipsBestrews the bed of every seaWhere German submarines have wroughtTheir horrors! Have you never thought,--What you call freedom, men call piracy!
Unnumbered ghosts that haunt the wave,Where you have murdered, cry you down;And seamen whom you would not save,Weave now in weed-grown depths a crownOf shame for your imperious head,A dark memorial of the deadWomen and children whom you sent to drown.
Nay, not till thieves are set to guardThe gold, and corsairs called to keepO'er peaceful commerce watch and ward,And wolves to herd the helpless sheep,Shall men and women look to thee,Thou ruthless Old Man of the Sea,To safeguard law and freedom on the deep!
In nobler breeds we put our trust:The nations in whose sacred loreThe "Ought" stands out above the "Must,"And honor rules in peace and war.With these we hold in soul and heart,With these we choose our lot and part,Till Liberty is safe on sea and shore.
Words in this poem
- perjured a.
- Guilty of perjury; having sworn falsely; forsworn.
- piracy n.
- The act or crime of a pirate. [Cf. LL. piratia, Gr. Pirate.]
- unnumbered a.
- Not numbered; not counted or estimated; innumerable.
- imperious a.
- Commanding; ascendant; imperial; lordly; majestic. [L. imperiosus: cf. F. impérieux. See Imperial.]
- 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,]
- ruthless a.
- Having no ruth; cruel; pitiless.
- safeguard n.
- One who, or that which, defends or protects; defense; protection. [Safe = guard: cf. F. sauvegarde.]
- 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.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Mare Liberum is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Henry Van Dyke, Project Gutenberg ebook #16229; 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 Van Dyke, Mare Liberum, in The Poems of Henry Van Dyke (1925), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #16229, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/van-dyke-poems/mare-liberum.html, id L22938.
Form and metre
Mare Liberum is 28 lines in 4 stanzas of 7 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABABCCB, complete in 2 of its 4 stanzas. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%).
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 ABABCC- lipsA · freeB · shipsA · seaB · wroughtC · thoughtC · piracy
- 2 ABABCCB waveA · downB · saveA · crownB · headC · deadC · drownB
- 3 -A-ABBA guard · keepA · ward · sheepA · theeB · seaB · deepA
- 4 ABABCCB trustA · loreB · mustA · warB · heartC · partC · shoreB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| You dare to say with perjured lips, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| "We fight to make the ocean free"? | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| You, whose black trail of butchered ships | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Bestrews the bed of every sea | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Where German submarines have wrought | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| Their horrors! Have you never thought,-- | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| What you call freedom, men call piracy! | 9 | ···/˘··/˘ |
| Unnumbered ghosts that haunt the wave, | 8 | ˘/˘····· |
| Where you have murdered, cry you down; | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And seamen whom you would not save, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Weave now in weed-grown depths a crown | 8 | ········ |
| Of shame for your imperious head, | 8 | ····˘/˘· |
| A dark memorial of the dead | 8 | ··˘/˘··· |
| Women and children whom you sent to drown. | 10 | /˘·/˘····· |
| Nay, not till thieves are set to guard | 8 | ········ |
| The gold, and corsairs called to keep | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| O'er peaceful commerce watch and ward, | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| And wolves to herd the helpless sheep, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Shall men and women look to thee, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Thou ruthless Old Man of the Sea, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| To safeguard law and freedom on the deep! | 10 | ·/···/˘··· |
| In nobler breeds we put our trust: | 8 | ·/˘···/· |
| The nations in whose sacred lore | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| The "Ought" stands out above the "Must," | 8 | ········ |
| And honor rules in peace and war. | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| With these we hold in soul and heart, | 8 | ········ |
| With these we choose our lot and part, | 8 | ····/··· |
| Till Liberty is safe on sea and shore. | 9 | ·/˘······ |
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.