Old and New
Long have the poets vaunted, in their lays,Old times, old loves, old friendship, and old wine.Why should the old monopolize all praise?Then let the new claim mine.
Give me strong new friends when the old prove weakOr fail me in my darkest hour of need;Why perish with the ship that springs a leakOr lean upon a reed?
Give me new love, warm, palpitating, sweet,When all the grace and beauty leave the old;When like a rose it withers at my feet,Or like a hearth grows cold.
Give me new times, bright with a prosperous cheer,In place of old, tear-blotted, burdened days;I hold a sunlit present far more dear,And worthy of my praise.
When the old deeds are threadbare and worn through,And all too narrow for the broadening soul,Give me the fine, firm texture of the new,Fair, beautiful, and whole!
Words in this poem
- withers n.
- The ridge between the shoulder bones of a horse, at the base of the neck. See Illust. of Horse. [Properly, the parts which resist the pull or strain in drawing a load; fr. OE. wither resistance, AS. withre, fr. wither against; akin to G. widerrist withers. ]
- sunlit a.
- Lighted by the sun.
- threadbare a.
- Worn to the naked thread; having the nap worn off; threadbare clothes.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Old and New is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems of Passion, Project Gutenberg ebook #16776; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Old and New, in Poems of Passion (1883), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #16776, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/wilcox-passion/old-and-new.html, id L22172.
Form and metre
Old and New is 20 lines in 5 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABAB. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 83%).
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 ABAB laysA · wineB · praiseA · mineB
- 2 ABAB weakA · needB · leakA · reedB
- 3 ABAB sweetA · oldB · feetA · coldB
- 4 ABAB cheerA · daysB · dearA · praiseB
- 5 ABAB throughA · soulB · newA · wholeB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Long have the poets vaunted, in their lays, | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Old times, old loves, old friendship, and old wine. | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Why should the old monopolize all praise? | 10 | ····˘/˘··· |
| Then let the new claim mine. | 6 | ······ |
| Give me strong new friends when the old prove weak | 10 | ·········· |
| Or fail me in my darkest hour of need; | 10 | ·····/˘/·· |
| Why perish with the ship that springs a leak | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Or lean upon a reed? | 6 | ······ |
| Give me new love, warm, palpitating, sweet, | 10 | ·····/˘˘˘· |
| When all the grace and beauty leave the old; | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| When like a rose it withers at my feet, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Or like a hearth grows cold. | 6 | ······ |
| Give me new times, bright with a prosperous cheer, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| In place of old, tear-blotted, burdened days; | 10 | ·····/˘/˘· |
| I hold a sunlit present far more dear, | 10 | ···/·/˘··· |
| And worthy of my praise. | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| When the old deeds are threadbare and worn through, | 10 | ·····/···· |
| And all too narrow for the broadening soul, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Give me the fine, firm texture of the new, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Fair, beautiful, and whole! | 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.