Oona
Where is the Countess Cathleen? All this dayHer eyes were full of tears, and when for a momentHer hand was laid upon my hand, it trembled.And now I do not know where she is gone.
Words in this poem
- countess n.
- The wife of an earl in the British peerage, or of a count in the Continental nobility; also, a lady possessed of the same dignity in her own right. See the Note under Count. [F. comtesse. See Count a nobleman.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Oona is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #38877; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: W. B. Yeats, Oona, in Poems (1895), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #38877, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/yeats-poems/oona-4.html, id L16708.
Form and metre
Oona is 4 lines in a single stanza. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic pentameter. 92% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.8 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
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.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Where is the Countess Cathleen? All this day | 10 | ···/˘·/··· |
| Her eyes were full of tears, and when for a moment | 12 | ··········/˘ |
| Her hand was laid upon my hand, it trembled. | 11 | ·········/˘ |
| And now I do not know where she is gone. | 10 | ·········· |
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.