The Friends of His Youth
Laughter not time destroyed my voiceAnd put that crack in it,And when the moon’s pot-belliedI get a laughing fit,For that old Madge comes down the laneA stone upon her breast,And a cloak wrapped about the stone,And she can get no restWith singing hush and hush-a-bye;She that has been wildAnd barren as a breaking waveThinks that the stone’s a child.And Peter that had great affairsAnd was a pushing manShrieks, ‘I am King of the Peacocks,’And perches on a stone;And then I laugh till tears run downAnd the heart thumps at my side,Remembering that her shriek was loveAnd that he shrieks from pride.
About this text
The Friends of His Youth 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, The Friends of His Youth, in The Tower (1928), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #72985, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/yeats-tower/the-friends-of-his-youth.html, id L19987.
Form and metre
The Friends of His Youth is 20 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 -A-A-BCB-D-D---C-E-E voice · itA · bellied · fitA · lane · breastB · stoneC · restB · bye · wildD · wave · childD · affairs · man · peacocks · stoneC · down · sideE · love · prideE
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Laughter not time destroyed my voice | 8 | /˘··˘/·· |
| And put that crack in it, | 6 | ······ |
| And when the moon’s pot-bellied | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| I get a laughing fit, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| For that old Madge comes down the lane | 8 | ········ |
| A stone upon her breast, | 6 | ······ |
| And a cloak wrapped about the stone, | 8 | ········ |
| And she can get no rest | 6 | ······ |
| With singing hush and hush-a-bye; | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| She that has been wild | 5 | ····· |
| And barren as a breaking wave | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Thinks that the stone’s a child. | 6 | ······ |
| And Peter that had great affairs | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| And was a pushing man | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Shrieks, ‘I am King of the Peacocks,’ | 8 | ······/· |
| And perches on a stone; | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| And then I laugh till tears run down | 8 | ········ |
| And the heart thumps at my side, | 7 | ······· |
| Remembering that her shriek was love | 9 | ˘/˘˘····· |
| And that he shrieks from pride. | 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.