O'Er the Wood's Brow
O'er the wood's brow,Pale, the moon stares;In every boughWandering airsFaintly suspire....
Two willow-treesWaver and weep,One in the breeze,One in the deepGlass of the stream....
An infiniteResignednessRains where the whiteMists opalesceIn the moon-shower....
Words in this poem
- suspire n.
- A long, deep breath; a sigh. [Cf. L. suspirium.]
- waver v. i.
- To play or move to and fro; to move one way and the other; hence, to totter; to reel; to swing; to flutter. [OE. waveren, from AS. wæfre wavering, restless. See Wave, v. i.]
- opalesce v. i.
- To give forth a play of colors, like the opal.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
O'Er the Wood's Brow is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #8426, the Gertrude Hall translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Paul Verlaine, O'Er the Wood's Brow, in Poems (1895), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #8426, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/verlaine-poems/o-er-the-wood-s-brow.html, id L15487.
Form and metre
O'Er the Wood's Brow is 15 lines in 3 stanzas of 5 lines each. 90% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 4.1 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 53% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 ABAB- browA · staresB · boughA · airsB · suspire
- 2 ABAB- treesA · weepB · breezeA · deepB · stream
- 3 A-A-- infiniteA · resignedness · whiteA · opalesce · shower
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| O'er the wood's brow, | 4 | ···· |
| Pale, the moon stares; | 4 | ···· |
| In every bough | 5 | ·/˘˘· |
| Wandering airs | 4 | /˘˘· |
| Faintly suspire.... | 4 | /˘˘/ |
| Two willow-trees | 4 | ·/·· |
| Waver and weep, | 4 | /˘·· |
| One in the breeze, | 4 | ···· |
| One in the deep | 4 | ···· |
| Glass of the stream.... | 4 | ···· |
| An infinite | 4 | ·/˘˘ |
| Resignedness | 4 | ···· |
| Rains where the white | 4 | ···· |
| Mists opalesce | 4 | ···· |
| In the moon-shower.... | 5 | ···/˘ |
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.