A Meeting
ON a sheer peak of joy we meet;Below us hums the abyss;Death either way allures our feetIf we take one step amiss.
One moment let us drink the blueTranscendent air together--Then down where the same old work's to doIn the same dull daily weather.
We may not wait . . . yet look below!How part? On this keen ridgeBut one may pass. They call you--go!My life shall be your bridge.
Fallopius had meanwhile died, and the Venetian Senate is said tohave offered Vesalius his old chair; but on the way home fromJerusalem he was seized with illness, and died at Zante in 1564.
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,]
- meanwhile n.
- The intervening time; as, in the meantime (or mean time).
- illness n.
- The condition of being ill, evil, or bad; badness; unfavorableness. [From Ill.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
A Meeting is in the public domain. This text is taken from Artemis to Actaeon, and Other Verses, Project Gutenberg ebook #4549; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Edith Wharton, A Meeting, in Artemis to Actaeon, and Other Verse (1909), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4549, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/wharton-artemis/a-meeting.html, id L22250.
Form and metre
A Meeting is 15 lines in 4 stanzas. The rhyme scheme is ABAB, complete in 3 of its 4 stanzas. The metre is common measure, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 78%).
See other poems in common measure.
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 meetA · abyssB · feetA · amissB
- 2 ABAB blueA · togetherB · doA · weatherB
- 3 ABAB belowA · ridgeB · goA · bridgeB
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 common measure. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| ON a sheer peak of joy we meet; | 8 | ········ |
| Below us hums the abyss; | 7 | ·····˘/ |
| Death either way allures our feet | 9 | ·/˘·˘//˘· |
| If we take one step amiss. | 7 | ·····˘/ |
| One moment let us drink the blue | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Transcendent air together-- | 7 | ˘/˘·˘/˘ |
| Then down where the same old work's to do | 9 | ········· |
| In the same dull daily weather. | 8 | ····/˘/˘ |
| We may not wait . . . yet look below! | 8 | ········ |
| How part? On this keen ridge | 6 | ······ |
| But one may pass. They call you--go! | 8 | ········ |
| My life shall be your bridge. | 6 | ······ |
| Fallopius had meanwhile died, and the Venetian Senate is said to | 17 | ····/····˘/˘/˘··· |
| have offered Vesalius his old chair; but on the way home from | 15 | ·/˘············ |
| Jerusalem he was seized with illness, and died at Zante in 1564. | 15 | ˘/˘····/˘···/˘· |
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.