The Child Meditates
The oak-tree in front of my houseSmells different every morning.Sometimes it smells fresh and wiseLike my mother’s hair.Sometimes it stands ashamedBecause it doesn’t own the smellIt borrowed from our flower-garden.Sometimes it has a windy smell,As though it had come back from a long walk.The oak-tree in front of my houseHas different smells, like grown up people.
My doll hides behind her pink cheeks,So that you can’t see when she moves,But it doesn’t matter becauseShe always moves when no one is looking,And that is why people think she is still.People laugh when I say that my doll is alive,But if she were dead, my fingersWouldn’t know that they were touching her.She lives inside a little house.And laughs because I cannot find the door.
The colours in my roomMeet each other and hesitate.Is that what people call shape?Nobody seems to think so,But I believe that lines are dead shapesUnless they fall against each otherAnd look surprised, like the colours in my room!
Words in this poem
- nobody n.
- No person; no one; not anybody. [No, a. + body.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Child Meditates is in the public domain. This text is taken from Advice: A Book of Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #60252; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Maxwell Bodenheim, The Child Meditates, in Advice: A Book of Poems (1920), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #60252, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/bodenheim-advice/the-child-meditates.html, id L23381.
Form and metre
The Child Meditates is 28 lines in 3 stanzas. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 80%).
See other poems in iambic tetrameter.
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 A----B-B-AB houseA · morning · wise · hair · ashamed · smellB · garden · smellB · walk · houseA · peopleB
- 2 --A---A--- cheeks · moves · becauseA · looking · still · alive · fingersA · her · house · door
- 3 A-----A roomA · hesitate · shape · so · shapes · other · roomA
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| The oak-tree in front of my house | 8 | ········ |
| Smells different every morning. | 9 | ·/˘˘/˘˘/˘ |
| Sometimes it smells fresh and wise | 7 | ˘/····· |
| Like my mother’s hair. | 5 | ··/˘· |
| Sometimes it stands ashamed | 7 | ˘/··˘/˘ |
| Because it doesn’t own the smell | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| It borrowed from our flower-garden. | 9 | ·/··//˘/˘ |
| Sometimes it has a windy smell, | 8 | ˘/···/˘· |
| As though it had come back from a long walk. | 10 | ·········· |
| The oak-tree in front of my house | 8 | ········ |
| Has different smells, like grown up people. | 9 | ·/˘····/˘ |
| My doll hides behind her pink cheeks, | 8 | ········ |
| So that you can’t see when she moves, | 8 | ········ |
| But it doesn’t matter because | 8 | ··/˘/˘·· |
| She always moves when no one is looking, | 10 | ·/······/˘ |
| And that is why people think she is still. | 10 | ····/˘···· |
| People laugh when I say that my doll is alive, | 12 | /˘········˘/ |
| But if she were dead, my fingers | 8 | ······/˘ |
| Wouldn’t know that they were touching her. | 9 | /˘····/˘· |
| She lives inside a little house. | 8 | ··˘/·/˘· |
| And laughs because I cannot find the door. | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| The colours in my room | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Meet each other and hesitate. | 8 | ··/˘·/˘· |
| Is that what people call shape? | 7 | ···/˘·· |
| Nobody seems to think so, | 7 | /······ |
| But I believe that lines are dead shapes | 9 | ··˘/····· |
| Unless they fall against each other | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| And look surprised, like the colours in my room! | 11 | ··˘/··/˘··· |
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.