Lyric Poem · Love

Serenade (For Music)

by Oscar Wilde

Reading room

1The western wind is blowing fair

2Across the dark AEgean sea,

3And at the secret marble stair

4My Tyrian galley waits for thee.

5Come down! the purple sail is spread,

6The watchman sleeps within the town,

7O leave thy lily-flowered bed,

8O Lady mine come down, come down!

9She will not come, I know her well,

10Of lover's vows she hath no care,

11And little good a man can tell

12Of one so cruel and so fair.

13True love is but a woman's toy,

14They never know the lover's pain,

15And I who loved as loves a boy

16Must love in vain, must love in vain.

17O noble pilot, tell me true,

18Is that the sheen of golden hair?

19Or is it but the tangled dew

20That binds the passion-flowers there?

21Good sailor come and tell me now

22Is that my Lady's lily hand?

23Or is it but the gleaming prow,

24Or is it but the silver sand?

25No! no! 'tis not the tangled dew,

26'Tis not the silver-fretted sand,

27It is my own dear Lady true

28With golden hair and lily hand!

29O noble pilot, steer for Troy,

30Good sailor, ply the labouring oar,

31This is the Queen of life and joy

32Whom we must bear from Grecian shore!

33The waning sky grows faint and blue,

34It wants an hour still of day,

35Aboard! aboard! my gallant crew,

36O Lady mine, away! away!

37O noble pilot, steer for Troy,

38Good sailor, ply the labouring oar,

39O loved as only loves a boy!

40O loved for ever evermore!

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“Serenade (For Music)” by Oscar Wilde — quilloak.com/poems/serenade-for-music

Quick facts

Poem: Serenade (For Music)
Poet: Oscar Wilde
Length: 40 lines
Form: Lyric Poem
Themes: Love, Nature, Dreams & Sleep

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: 40 lines · 5 octaves
Line length: Mostly 8-syllable lines (tetrameter length).
Refrains: “O noble pilot, steer for Troy,”“Good sailor, ply the labouring oar,”Repeated lines act as the poem's hinge or drumbeat.

The poem’s silhouette — approximate syllables per line, measured from the text above. Even bars mean a measured line; ragged bars mean the poem sets its own widths.

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Text, source & rights

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Author record: Oscar Wilde1854–1900
Source record: PoetryDBSerenade (For Music) by oscar-wilde, PoetryDB transcription
Display decision: Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
Publication record: Not recorded in the imported source
Text fingerprint: SHA-256 230f85d8c3b0f165…
Editorial handling: Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.

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Lyric Poem Love Nature Dreams & Sleep

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