Carmen XXI: To Aurelius the Skinflint
Aurelius, father of the famisht crew,Not sole of starvelings now, but wretches whoWere, are, or shall be in the years to come,My love, my dearling, fain art thou to strum.Nor privately; for nigh thou com'st and jestestAnd to his side close-sticking all things questest.'Tis vain: while lay'st thou snares for me the worst,By ---- I will teach thee first.An food-full thus do thou, my peace I'd keep:But what (ah me! ah me!) compels me weepAre thirst and famine to my dearling fated.Cease thou so doing while as modest rated,Lest to thy will thou win--but ----
Words in this poem
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- fain v. t.
- To be glad ; to wish or desire.
- strum v. t.
- To play on an instrument of music, or as on an instrument, in an unskillful or noisy way; to thrum; as, to strum a piano. [Probably of imitative origin. Cf. Thrum.]
- famine n.
- General scarcity of food; dearth; a want of provisions; destitution. [F. famine, fr. L. fames hunger; cf. Gr. hani loss, lack, ha to leave.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Carmen XXI: To Aurelius the Skinflint is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Carmina, Project Gutenberg ebook #20732, the Richard Burton translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Catullus, Carmen XXI: To Aurelius the Skinflint, in The Carmina (1894), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #20732, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/catullus-carmina/carmen-xxi-to-aurelius-the-skinflint.html, id L13804.
Form and metre
Carmen XXI: To Aurelius the Skinflint is 13 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 92% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.8 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 23% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in heroic couplets, other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 AABBCCDDEEFF- crewA · whoA · comeB · strumB · jestestC · questestC · worstD · firstD · keepE · weepE · fatedF · ratedF · but
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 pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Aurelius, father of the famisht crew, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Not sole of starvelings now, but wretches who | 11 | ··········· |
| Were, are, or shall be in the years to come, | 10 | ·········· |
| My love, my dearling, fain art thou to strum. | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Nor privately; for nigh thou com'st and jestest | 11 | ·/˘˘·····/˘ |
| And to his side close-sticking all things questest. | 11 | ·····/˘··/˘ |
| 'Tis vain: while lay'st thou snares for me the worst, | 10 | ·········· |
| By ---- I will teach thee first. | 6 | ······ |
| An food-full thus do thou, my peace I'd keep: | 10 | ·········· |
| But what (ah me! ah me!) compels me weep | 10 | ······˘/·· |
| Are thirst and famine to my dearling fated. | 11 | ···/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Cease thou so doing while as modest rated, | 11 | ···/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Lest to thy will thou win--but ---- | 7 | ······· |
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.