El Wuish

Letitia Elizabeth Landon 1802 (Chelsea) – 1838 (Cape Coast)



El Wuish a small harbour on the Arabian coast of the Red Sea. The intricacies of a great and almost unbroken extent of coral reefs, renders the navigation rather difficult, and extremely tedious. The boatmen often beguile the night by singing. The imagery of the following song is taken from some Persian translations kindly placed in my hands by Sir Gore Ouseley : of course, it is a very free paraphrase.

Leila, the flowers are withered now,
    The flowers I scattered at thy side
What time Zoharah's* silver star
    Was mirror'd in the fountain's tide ;

The fountain played, and flung its drops
    Like pearls amid thy raven hair;
I had not seen the mirror'd star,
    But thou too wert reflected there.

Thyself and thy sweet phantom self
    That parting hour were both my own.
My heart seemed like the fountain, made
    To image love and thee alone.

When thou had past, that faithless wave
    No likeness of thy grace retained.
But though my Leila's self be gone,
    Yet Leila's memory has remained.

Thou dost consume thy dwelling-place—
    Take from thy wreath of flowers a sign,
The tulip hides its withered core,
    And such a burning heart is mine.

I call thine image to my sleep,
    I wake and watch the waves again,
I think thy words, I dream thy smiles,
    Ah! Arab maid, I dream in vain.

* The Eastern name for the planet Venus.
Font size:
Collection  PDF     
 

Submitted by Madeleine Quinn on July 11, 2016

Modified by Madeleine Quinn on February 15, 2020

1:12 min read
97

Quick analysis:

Scheme X XABA XCBC XDXD XEXE XFXF XXXX X
Closest metre Iambic hexameter
Characters 1,328
Words 234
Stanzas 8
Stanza Lengths 1, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 1

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

Letitia Elizabeth Landon was an English poet. Born 14th August 1802 at 25 Hans Place, Chelsea, she lived through the most productive period of her life nearby, at No.22. A precocious child with a natural gift for poetry, she was driven by the financial needs of her family to become a professional writer and thus a target for malicious gossip (although her three children by William Jerdan were successfully hidden from the public). In 1838, she married George Maclean, governor of Cape Coast Castle on the Gold Coast, whence she travelled, only to die a few months later (15th October) of a fatal heart condition. Behind her post-Romantic style of sentimentality lie preoccupations with art, decay and loss that give her poetry its characteristic intensity and in this vein she attempted to reinterpret some of the great male texts from a woman’s perspective. Her originality rapidly led to her being one of the most read authors of her day and her influence, commencing with Tennyson in England and Poe in America, was long-lasting. However, Victorian attitudes led to her poetry being misrepresented and she became excluded from the canon of English literature, where she belongs. more…

All Letitia Elizabeth Landon poems | Letitia Elizabeth Landon Books

3 fans

Discuss the poem El Wuish with the community...

0 Comments

    Translation

    Find a translation for this poem in other languages:

    Select another language:

    • - Select -
    • 简体中文 (Chinese - Simplified)
    • 繁體中文 (Chinese - Traditional)
    • Español (Spanish)
    • Esperanto (Esperanto)
    • 日本語 (Japanese)
    • Português (Portuguese)
    • Deutsch (German)
    • العربية (Arabic)
    • Français (French)
    • Русский (Russian)
    • ಕನ್ನಡ (Kannada)
    • 한국어 (Korean)
    • עברית (Hebrew)
    • Gaeilge (Irish)
    • Українська (Ukrainian)
    • اردو (Urdu)
    • Magyar (Hungarian)
    • मानक हिन्दी (Hindi)
    • Indonesia (Indonesian)
    • Italiano (Italian)
    • தமிழ் (Tamil)
    • Türkçe (Turkish)
    • తెలుగు (Telugu)
    • ภาษาไทย (Thai)
    • Tiếng Việt (Vietnamese)
    • Čeština (Czech)
    • Polski (Polish)
    • Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian)
    • Românește (Romanian)
    • Nederlands (Dutch)
    • Ελληνικά (Greek)
    • Latinum (Latin)
    • Svenska (Swedish)
    • Dansk (Danish)
    • Suomi (Finnish)
    • فارسی (Persian)
    • ייִדיש (Yiddish)
    • հայերեն (Armenian)
    • Norsk (Norwegian)
    • English (English)

    Citation

    Use the citation below to add this poem to your bibliography:

    Style:MLAChicagoAPA

    "El Wuish" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 Mar. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/44972/el-wuish>.

    Become a member!

    Join our community of poets and poetry lovers to share your work and offer feedback and encouragement to writers all over the world!

    March 2024

    Poetry Contest

    Join our monthly contest for an opportunity to win cash prizes and attain global acclaim for your talent.
    3
    days
    12
    hours
    1
    minute

    Special Program

    Earn Rewards!

    Unlock exciting rewards such as a free mug and free contest pass by commenting on fellow members' poems today!

    Browse Poetry.com

    Quiz

    Are you a poetry master?

    »
    Who wrote the poem "Ozymandias"?
    A Rainer Maria Rilke
    B Rudyard Kipling
    C William Wordsworth
    D Percy Bysshe Shelley