To a Young Girl
My dear, my dear, I knowMore than anotherWhat makes your heart beat so;Not even your own motherCan know it as I know,Who broke my heart for herWhen the wild thought,That she deniesAnd has forgot,Set all her blood astirAnd glittered in her eyes.
Words in this poem
- broke v. i.
- To transact business for another. Brome. [See Broker, and cf. Brook.]
- astir adv.
- Stirring; in a state of activity or motion; out of bed. [Pref. a- + stir.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
To a Young Girl 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, To a Young Girl, in The Wild Swans at Coole (1919), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #32491, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/yeats-wild-swans/to-a-young-girl.html, id L20008.
Form and metre
To a Young Girl is 11 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
See other poems in iambic trimeter.
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 ABABAC-D-CD knowA · anotherB · soA · motherB · knowA · herC · thought · deniesD · forgot · astirC · eyesD
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| My dear, my dear, I know | 6 | ······ |
| More than another | 5 | ··˘/˘ |
| What makes your heart beat so; | 6 | ······ |
| Not even your own mother | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
| Can know it as I know, | 6 | ······ |
| Who broke my heart for her | 6 | ······ |
| When the wild thought, | 4 | ···· |
| That she denies | 4 | ··˘/ |
| And has forgot, | 4 | ··˘/ |
| Set all her blood astir | 6 | ····˘/ |
| And glittered in her eyes. | 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.