To Those Who’ve Fail’d
To those who’ve fail’d, in aspiration vast,To unnam’d soldiers fallen in front on the lead,To calm, devoted engineers--to over-ardent travelers--to pilots ontheir ships,To many a lofty song and picture without recognition--I’d rearlaurel-cover’d monument,High, high above the rest--To all cut off before their time,Possess’d by some strange spirit of fire,Quench’d by an early death.
Words in this poem
- aspiration n.
- The act of aspirating; the pronunciation of a letter with a full or strong emission of breath; an aspirated sound. [L. aspiratio, fr. aspirare: cf. F. aspiration.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
To Those Who’ve Fail’d 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, To Those Who’ve Fail’d, in Leaves of Grass (1855–1892), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1322, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/whitman-leaves/to-those-who-ve-fail-d.html, id L04075.
Form and metre
To Those Who’ve Fail’d is 9 lines in a single verse paragraph. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. 88% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 11.0 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 22% 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.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| To those who’ve fail’d, in aspiration vast, | 10 | ······˘/˘· |
| To unnam’d soldiers fallen in front on the lead, | 12 | ·˘//˘/˘····· |
| To calm, devoted engineers--to over-ardent travelers--to pilots on | 20 | ··˘/˘/˘/···/˘/˘˘·/˘· |
| their ships, | 2 | ·· |
| To many a lofty song and picture without recognition--I’d rear | 18 | ·/˘·/˘··/˘···˘/˘·· |
| laurel-cover’d monument, | 7 | /˘/˘/˘˘ |
| High, high above the rest--To all cut off before their time, | 14 | ·············· |
| Possess’d by some strange spirit of fire, | 10 | ˘/···/˘·/˘ |
| Quench’d by an early death. | 6 | ···/˘· |
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.