Presences
This night has been so strange that it seemedAs if the hair stood up on my head.From going-down of the sun I have dreamedThat women laughing, or timid or wild,In rustle of lace or silken stuff,Climbed up my creaking stair. They had readAll I had rhymed of that monstrous thingReturned and yet unrequited love.They stood in the door and stood betweenMy great wood lecturn and the fireTill I could hear their hearts beating:One is a harlot, and one a childThat never looked upon man with desire,And one it may be a queen.
Words in this poem
- rustle v. i.
- To make a quick succession of small sounds, like the rubbing or moving of silk cloth or dry leaves. [AS. hristlan to rustle; or cf. Sw. rusta to stir, make a riot, or E. rush, v.]
- lecturn n.
- A choir desk, or reading desk, in some churches, from which the lections, or Scripture lessons, are chanted or read; hence, a reading desk. . Fairholt. [LL. lectrinum, fr. lectrum; cf. L. legere, lectum, to read.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Presences is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Wild Swans at Coole, Project Gutenberg ebook #32491; 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, Presences, in The Wild Swans at Coole (1919), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #32491, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/yeats-wild-swans/presences.html, id L20022.
Form and metre
Presences is 14 lines in a single stanza. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic tetrameter.
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 ABAC-BD-EFDCFE seemedA · headB · dreamedA · wildC · stuff · readB · thingD · love · betweenE · fireF · beatingD · childC · desireF · queenE
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 |
|---|---|---|
| This night has been so strange that it seemed | 10 | ·········˘ |
| As if the hair stood up on my head. | 9 | ········· |
| From going-down of the sun I have dreamed | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| That women laughing, or timid or wild, | 10 | ·/˘/˘·/˘·· |
| In rustle of lace or silken stuff, | 9 | ·/˘···/˘· |
| Climbed up my creaking stair. They had read | 10 | ·˘··/˘···· |
| All I had rhymed of that monstrous thing | 10 | ····˘··/˘· |
| Returned and yet unrequited love. | 10 | ˘/˘···˘/˘· |
| They stood in the door and stood between | 9 | ········· |
| My great wood lecturn and the fire | 9 | ···/˘··/˘ |
| Till I could hear their hearts beating: | 8 | ······/˘ |
| One is a harlot, and one a child | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| That never looked upon man with desire, | 11 | ·/˘·····˘/˘ |
| And one it may be a queen. | 7 | ······· |
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.