Lyric Poem · Love
A Birthday
by Christina Rossetti · 1861
Full-text availability follows the United States display decision recorded below; status can differ elsewhere.
“A Birthday” by Christina Rossetti — quilloak.com/poems/a-birthday
Quick facts
- Poem
- A Birthday
- Poet
- Christina Rossetti
- Published
- 1861
- Length
- 16 lines
- Form
- Lyric Poem, Rhyming Poems
- Themes
- Love, Happiness
Craft notes
How this poem works
Measured from the text on this page, not copied from a summary. Counts are approximate: syllables and rhymes come from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which models General American English, so dialect, older pronunciation, and performance can all change what you hear.
- Shape
- 16 lines · 2 octaves
- Line length
- Mostly 8-syllable lines (tetrameter length).
Want the rules this form is measured against? Read what makes a lyric poem, or run your own draft through the form checker to see the same measurements on your lines. How we measure · Report a mistake
Text, source & rights
A traceable edition
Full-text display is based on the committed source record and a United States term-expiry review.
- Author record
- Christina Rossetti1830–1894
- Source record
- PoetryDBA Birthday by christina-rossetti, PoetryDB transcription
- Display decision
- Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
- Publication record
- 1861
- Text fingerprint
- SHA-256 1a13463628815446…
- Editorial handling
- Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.