What Little Things!
What little things are thoseThat hold our happiness!A smile, a glance, a roseDropped from her hair or dress;A word, a look, a touch,--These are so much, so much.
An air we can't forget;A sunset's gold that gleams;A spray of mignonette,Will fill the soul with dreamsMore than all history says,Or romance of old days.
For of the human heart,Not brain, is memory;These things it makes a partOf its own entity;The joys, the pains whereofAre the very food of love.
Words in this poem
- mignonette n.
- A plant (Reseda odorata) having greenish flowers with orange- colored stamens, and exhaling a delicious fragrance. In Africa it is a low shrub, but further north it is usually an annual herb. [F. mignonnette, dim. of mignon darling. See 2d Minion.]
- whereof adv.
- Of which; of whom; formerly, also, with which; -- used relatively.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
What Little Things! is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #7796; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Madison Julius Cawein, What Little Things!, in Poems (1911), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #7796, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/cawein-poems/what-little-things.html, id L10860.
Form and metre
What Little Things! is 18 lines in 3 stanzas of 6 lines each. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%). 93% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 6.2 syllables. 3 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 28% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic trimeter.
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 ABABCC thoseA · happinessB · roseA · dressB · touchC · muchC
- 2 ABAB-- forgetA · gleamsB · mignonetteA · dreamsB · says · days
- 3 A-A-BB heartA · memory · partA · entity · whereofB · loveB
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| What little things are those | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| That hold our happiness! | 7 | ··/˘/˘˘ |
| A smile, a glance, a rose | 6 | ······ |
| Dropped from her hair or dress; | 6 | ······ |
| A word, a look, a touch,-- | 6 | ······ |
| These are so much, so much. | 6 | ······ |
| An air we can't forget; | 6 | ····˘/ |
| A sunset's gold that gleams; | 6 | ·/···· |
| A spray of mignonette, | 6 | ······ |
| Will fill the soul with dreams | 6 | ······ |
| More than all history says, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Or romance of old days. | 6 | ·˘/··· |
| For of the human heart, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Not brain, is memory; | 6 | ···/˘˘ |
| These things it makes a part | 6 | ······ |
| Of its own entity; | 6 | ···/˘˘ |
| The joys, the pains whereof | 6 | ······ |
| Are the very food of love. | 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.