Summer and Spring
We sat under an old thorn-treeAnd talked away the night,Told all that had been said or doneSince first we saw the light,And when we talked of growing upKnew that we’d halved a soulAnd fell the one in t’other’s armsThat we might make it whole;Then Peter had a murdering lookFor it seemed that he and sheHad spoken of their childish daysUnder that very tree.O what a bursting out there was,And what a blossoming,When we had all the summer timeAnd she had all the spring.
Words in this poem
- halved a.
- Appearing as if one side, or one half, were cut away; dimidiate.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Summer and Spring is in the public domain. This text is taken from The tower, Project Gutenberg ebook #72985; 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, Summer and Spring, in The Tower (1928), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #72985, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/yeats-tower/summer-and-spring.html, id L19988.
Form and metre
Summer and Spring is 16 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 87%).
See other poems in iambic tetrameter.
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 AB-B-C-C-A-A-D-D treeA · nightB · done · lightB · up · soulC · arms · wholeC · look · sheA · days · treeA · was · blossomingD · time · springD
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| We sat under an old thorn-tree | 8 | ········ |
| And talked away the night, | 6 | ··˘/·· |
| Told all that had been said or done | 8 | ········ |
| Since first we saw the light, | 6 | ······ |
| And when we talked of growing up | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Knew that we’d halved a soul | 6 | ······ |
| And fell the one in t’other’s arms | 8 | ········ |
| That we might make it whole; | 6 | ······ |
| Then Peter had a murdering look | 9 | ·/˘··/˘˘· |
| For it seemed that he and she | 7 | ······· |
| Had spoken of their childish days | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Under that very tree. | 6 | ···/˘· |
| O what a bursting out there was, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And what a blossoming, | 6 | ···/˘˘ |
| When we had all the summer time | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And she had all the spring. | 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.