# There Will Come Soft Rains analysis

There Will Come Soft Rains — Sara Teasdale (1920)

Teasdale imagines spring continuing after humanity and its wars have disappeared, making nature’s beauty both consolation and rebuke.

Full text from [Flame and Shadow](https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Flame_and_Shadow/%22There_Will_Come_Soft_Rains%22). Public domain in the US (First published in 1918 and public domain in the United States.).

## Summary

Rain, swallows, frogs, plum trees, and robins continue their spring life after the war.[1]

```
There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
And frogs in the pools singing at night,
```

Nature neither knows nor cares if humanity perishes utterly.[3]

## Meaning and interpretation

The calm pastoral surface makes human violence appear temporary, while the repeated “not one” removes every possible witness.[3]

```
And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
```

The ending is bleak but not lifeless: Spring still wakes, joining consolation with a rebuke to human self-importance.[4]

## Themes

### Nature’s indifference

Birds, trees, and Spring continue on their own terms rather than serving as witnesses to history.[3]

### War and human fragility

```
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree
If mankind perished utterly;
```

The brief mention of war expands into the possibility of total human extinction.

### Renewal and extinction

Spring’s renewal survives humanity, making rebirth both hopeful and unsettling.

## Form and meter

The twelve-line poem is arranged as six rhyming couplets, with a clear AA BB CC DD EE FF pattern.[4]

Loose tetrameter and regular couplets create songlike calm that contrasts with the subject of extinction.

## Literary devices

### Sensory imagery

```
There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
```

Smell and sound establish a vivid spring before the war is named.

### Personification

```
And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,
Would scarcely know that we were gone.
```

Spring becomes a waking figure whose indifference makes extinction intimate and strange.

### Repetition

```
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree
If mankind perished utterly;
```

“Not one” narrows the poem toward absolute absence.

## Historical context

Teasdale first published the poem in Harper’s Magazine in 1918 and added “War Time” for Flame and Shadow in 1920.[4]

The subtitle places the peaceful landscape against World War I without depicting a battlefield.[3]

## What critics say

> “The poem frames humanity’s squabbles as both an affront to nature and totally insignificant in the long run.”
>
> — [LitCharts](https://www.litcharts.com/poetry/sara-teasdale/there-will-come-soft-rains)

> “Teasdale writes in six rhymed couplets, in a loose tetrameter that gives the lines a song-like, almost nursery-rhyme simplicity.”
>
> — [Poetry Database](https://poetrydatabase.com/poems/there-will-come-soft-rains/)

## Common questions

### What is the poem’s meaning?

Nature continues after humanity destroys itself, making war seem temporary and human life fragile.

### What are its themes?

Nature’s indifference, war, extinction, and renewal.

### What form does it use?

Six rhyming couplets in loose tetrameter.

## References

- [Academy of American Poets](https://poets.org/poem/there-will-come-soft-rains)

- [Wikisource](https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Flame_and_Shadow/%22There_Will_Come_Soft_Rains%22)

- [LitCharts](https://www.litcharts.com/poetry/sara-teasdale/there-will-come-soft-rains)

- [Poetry Database](https://poetrydatabase.com/poems/there-will-come-soft-rains/)

## Open the editor

Write with this poem’s meter in the editor: https://lyriic.com/write/iambic-tetrameter