Reconciliation
Some may have blamed you that you took awayThe verses that could move them on the dayWhen, the ears being deafened, the sight of the eyes blindWith lightning you went from me, and I could findNothing to make a song about but kings,Helmets, and swords, and half-forgotten thingsThat were like memories of you--but nowWe'll out, for the world lives as long ago;And while we're in our laughing, weeping fit,Hurl helmets, crowns, and swords into the pit.But, dear, cling close to me; since you were gone,My barren thoughts have chilled me to the bone.
Words in this poem
- went n.
- Course; way; path; journey; direction.
- chilled a.
- Hardened on the surface or edge by chilling; as, chilled iron; a chilled wheel.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Reconciliation is in the public domain. This text is taken from Responsibilities, and other poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #36865; 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, Reconciliation, in Responsibilities (1914), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #36865, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/yeats-responsibilities/reconciliation.html, id L04587.
Form and metre
Reconciliation is 12 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 67% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 83%). 90% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.2 syllables. 50% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in heroic couplets, 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 AABBCC--DD-- awayA · dayA · blindB · findB · kingsC · thingsC · now · ago · fitD · pitD · gone · bone
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Some may have blamed you that you took away | 10 | ········˘/ |
| The verses that could move them on the day | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| When, the ears being deafened, the sight of the eyes blind | 12 | ···//˘······ |
| With lightning you went from me, and I could find | 11 | ·/˘········ |
| Nothing to make a song about but kings, | 10 | /˘········ |
| Helmets, and swords, and half-forgotten things | 10 | /˘····˘/˘· |
| That were like memories of you--but now | 10 | ···/˘˘···· |
| We'll out, for the world lives as long ago; | 10 | ········˘/ |
| And while we're in our laughing, weeping fit, | 10 | ····//˘/˘· |
| Hurl helmets, crowns, and swords into the pit. | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| But, dear, cling close to me; since you were gone, | 10 | ·········· |
| My barren thoughts have chilled me to the bone. | 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.