Non Dolet!
AGE after age the fruit of knowledge fallsTo ashes on men's lips;Love fails, faith sickens, like a dying treeLife sheds its dreams that no new spring recalls;The longed-for shipsCome empty home or founder on the deep,And eyes first lose their tears and then their sleep.
So weary a world it lies, forlorn of day,And yet not wholly dark,Since evermore some soul that missed the markCalls back to those agropeIn the mad maze of hope,"Courage, my brothers--I have found the way!"
The day is lost? What then?What though the straggling rear-guard of the fightBe whelmed in fear and night,And the flying scouts proclaimThat death has gripped the van--Ever the heart of manCheers on the hearts of men!
"It hurts not!" dying cried the Roman wife;And one by oneThe leaders in the strifeFall on the blade of failure and exclaim:"The day is won!"
Words in this poem
- forlorn a.
- Deserted abandoned; lost. [OE., p.p. of forlesen to lose utterly, AS. forleósan (p.p. forloren); pref. for- + leósan (in comp.) to lose; cf. D. verliezen to lose, G. verlieren, Sw. förlor]
- evermore adv.
- During eternity; always; forever; for an indefinite period; at all times; -- often used substantively with for.
- agrope adv.
- In the act of groping. Mrs. Browning. [Pref. a- + grope.]
- maze n.
- A wild fancy; a confused notion. [OE. mase; cf. OE. masen to confuse, puzzle, Norweg. masast to fall into a slumber, masa to be continually busy, prate, chatter, Icel. masa to chatter, dial. Sw.]
- straggling a.
- from Straggle, v.
- strife n.
- The act of striving; earnest endeavor. [OF. estrif. See Strive.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Non Dolet! 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, Non Dolet!, in Artemis to Actaeon, and Other Verse (1909), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4549, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/wharton-artemis/non-dolet.html, id L22246.
Form and metre
Non Dolet! is 25 lines in 4 stanzas. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic pentameter.
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 AB-ABCC fallsA · lipsB · tree · recallsA · shipsB · deepC · sleepC
- 2 ABBCCA dayA · darkB · markB · agropeC · hopeC · wayA
- 3 ABB-CCA thenA · fightB · nightB · proclaim · vanC · manC · menA
- 4 ABA-B wifeA · oneB · strifeA · exclaim · wonB
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 pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| AGE after age the fruit of knowledge falls | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| To ashes on men's lips; | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Love fails, faith sickens, like a dying tree | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Life sheds its dreams that no new spring recalls; | 10 | ········/· |
| The longed-for ships | 4 | ···· |
| Come empty home or founder on the deep, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| And eyes first lose their tears and then their sleep. | 10 | ·········· |
| So weary a world it lies, forlorn of day, | 11 | ·/˘····˘/·· |
| And yet not wholly dark, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Since evermore some soul that missed the mark | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Calls back to those agrope | 6 | ····˘/ |
| In the mad maze of hope, | 6 | ······ |
| "Courage, my brothers--I have found the way!" | 10 | /˘·/˘····· |
| The day is lost? What then? | 6 | ······ |
| What though the straggling rear-guard of the fight | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Be whelmed in fear and night, | 6 | ······ |
| And the flying scouts proclaim | 7 | ··/˘·˘/ |
| That death has gripped the van-- | 6 | ······ |
| Ever the heart of man | 6 | /˘···· |
| Cheers on the hearts of men! | 6 | ······ |
| "It hurts not!" dying cried the Roman wife; | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| And one by one | 4 | ···· |
| The leaders in the strife | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Fall on the blade of failure and exclaim: | 10 | ·····/˘·˘/ |
| "The day is won!" | 4 | ···· |
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.