Soon Shall the Winter’s Foil Be Here
Soon shall the winter’s foil be here;Soon shall these icy ligatures unbind and melt--A little while,And air, soil, wave, suffused shall be in softness, bloom andgrowth--a thousand forms shall riseFrom these dead clods and chills as from low burial graves.
Thine eyes, ears--all thy best attributes--all that takes cognizanceof natural beauty,Shall wake and fill. Thou shalt perceive the simple shows, thedelicate miracles of earth,Dandelions, clover, the emerald grass, the early scents and flowers,The arbutus under foot, the willow’s yellow-green, the blossomingplum and cherry;With these the robin, lark and thrush, singing their songs--theflitting bluebird;For such the scenes the annual play brings on.
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,]
- burial n.
- A grave; a tomb; a place of sepulture. [OE. buriel, buriels, grave, tomb, AS. byrgels, fr. byrgan to bury, and akin to OS. burgisli sepulcher.]
- shalt
- 2d per. sing. of Shall.
- flitting n.
- A flying with lightness and celerity; a fluttering.
- bluebird n.
- A small song bird (Sialia sialis), very common in the United States, and, in the north, one of the earliest to arrive in spring.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Soon Shall the Winter’s Foil Be Here is in the public domain. This text is taken from Leaves of Grass, Project Gutenberg ebook #1322; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Walt Whitman, Soon Shall the Winter’s Foil Be Here, in Leaves of Grass (1855–1892), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1322, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/whitman-leaves/soon-shall-the-winter-s-foil-be-here.html, id L04105.
Form and metre
Soon Shall the Winter’s Foil Be Here is 15 lines in 2 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. 81% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 11.0 syllables. 5 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 40% 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.
- 2 --A----A-- cognizance · beauty · theA · earth · flowers · blossoming · cherry · theA · bluebird · on
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Soon shall the winter’s foil be here; | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Soon shall these icy ligatures unbind and melt--A little while, | 16 | ···/˘···˘/···/˘· |
| And air, soil, wave, suffused shall be in softness, bloom and | 13 | ····˘/···/˘·· |
| growth--a thousand forms shall rise | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| From these dead clods and chills as from low burial graves. | 13 | ·········/˘˘· |
| Thine eyes, ears--all thy best attributes--all that takes cognizance | 15 | ······/˘····/˘˘ |
| of natural beauty, | 6 | ·/˘˘/˘ |
| Shall wake and fill. Thou shalt perceive the simple shows, the | 13 | ······˘/·/˘·· |
| delicate miracles of earth, | 8 | /˘˘/˘˘·· |
| Dandelions, clover, the emerald grass, the early scents and flowers, | 17 | /˘·˘/˘·/˘··/˘··/˘ |
| The arbutus under foot, the willow’s yellow-green, the blossoming | 17 | ········/·/˘··/˘˘ |
| plum and cherry; | 4 | ··/˘ |
| With these the robin, lark and thrush, singing their songs--the | 13 | ···/˘···/˘··· |
| flitting bluebird; | 4 | /˘/· |
| For such the scenes the annual play brings on. | 11 | ·····/˘˘··· |
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.