To Expression
Expression, child of soul! I fondly traceThy strong enchantments, when the poet's lyre,The painter's pencil catch thy sacred fire,And beauty wakes for thee her touching grace--But from this frighted glance thy form avertWhen horrors check thy tear, thy struggling sigh,When frenzy rolls in thy impassion'd eye,Or guilt sits heavy on thy lab'ring heart--Nor ever let my shudd'ring fancy bearThe wasting groan, or view the pallid lookOf him the Muses lov'd--when hope forsookHis spirit, vainly to the Muses dear!For charm'd with heav'nly song, this bleeding breast,Mourns the blest power of verse could give despair no rest.--
Words in this poem
- fondly adv.
- Foolishly. Verstegan (1673).
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
To Expression is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems (1786), Volume I., Project Gutenberg ebook #11054; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Helen Maria Williams, To Expression, in Poems (1786) (1786), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #11054, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/williams-helen-poems/to-expression.html, id L10042.
Form and metre
To Expression is 14 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 94%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.2 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 36% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 ABBA-CC-DEEDFF traceA · lyreB · fireB · graceA · avert · sighC · eyeC · heart · bearD · lookE · forsookE · dearD · breastF · restF
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Expression, child of soul! I fondly trace | 10 | ˘/˘····/˘· |
| Thy strong enchantments, when the poet's lyre, | 10 | ··˘/˘··/˘· |
| The painter's pencil catch thy sacred fire, | 11 | ·/˘/˘··/˘/˘ |
| And beauty wakes for thee her touching grace-- | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| But from this frighted glance thy form avert | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| When horrors check thy tear, thy struggling sigh, | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| When frenzy rolls in thy impassion'd eye, | 10 | ·/˘···˘/˘· |
| Or guilt sits heavy on thy lab'ring heart-- | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Nor ever let my shudd'ring fancy bear | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| The wasting groan, or view the pallid look | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| Of him the Muses lov'd--when hope forsook | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| His spirit, vainly to the Muses dear! | 10 | ·/˘/˘··/˘· |
| For charm'd with heav'nly song, this bleeding breast, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Mourns the blest power of verse could give despair no rest.-- | 12 | ···/····˘/·· |
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.