An Explanation
Look heah! 'Splain to me de reasonWhy you said to Squire Lee,Der wuz twelve ole chicken thievesIn dis heah town, includin' me.Ef he tole you dat, my brudder,He said sump'n dat warn't true;W'at I said wuz dis, dat der wuzTwelve, widout includin' you.
Words in this poem
- tole v. t.
- To draw, or cause to follow, by displaying something pleasing or desirable; to allure by some bait. [OE. tollen to draw, to entice; of uncertain origin. Cf. Toll to ring a bell.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
An Explanation is in the public domain. This text is taken from Fifty Years, & Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #17884; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: James Weldon Johnson, An Explanation, in Fifty Years and Other Poems (1917), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #17884, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/johnson-fifty-years/an-explanation.html, id L08347.
Form and metre
An Explanation is 8 lines in a single stanza. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 75%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.2 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 38% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in trochaic 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-A-B-B reason · leeA · thieves · meA · brudder · trueB · wuz · youB
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 trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Look heah! 'Splain to me de reason | 8 | ······/˘ |
| Why you said to Squire Lee, | 6 | ······ |
| Der wuz twelve ole chicken thieves | 7 | ····/˘· |
| In dis heah town, includin' me. | 8 | ········ |
| Ef he tole you dat, my brudder, | 8 | ········ |
| He said sump'n dat warn't true; | 6 | ······ |
| W'at I said wuz dis, dat der wuz | 8 | ········ |
| Twelve, widout includin' you. | 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.