Music
The neighbour sits in his window and plays the flute.From my bed I can hear him,And the round notes flutter and tap about the room,And hit against each other,Blurring to unexpected chords.It is very beautiful,With the little flute-notes all about me,In the darkness.
In the daytime,The neighbour eats bread and onions with one handAnd copies music with the other.He is fat and has a bald head,So I do not look at him,But run quickly past his window.There is always the sky to look at,Or the water in the well!
But when night comes and he plays his flute,I think of him as a young man,With gold seals hanging from his watch,And a blue coat with silver buttons.As I lie in my bedThe flute-notes push against my ears and lips,And I go to sleep, dreaming.
Words in this poem
- neighbour v. i.
- To dwell in the vicinity; to be a neighbor, or in the neighborhood; to be near.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Music is in the public domain. This text is taken from Sword Blades and Poppy Seed, Project Gutenberg ebook #1020; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Amy Lowell, Music, in Sword Blades and Poppy Seed (1914), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1020, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/lowell-amy-sword-blades/music.html, id L08244.
Form and metre
Music is 23 lines in 3 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 76%). 93% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.1 syllables. 7 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 9% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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.
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 neighbour sits in his window and plays the flute. | 12 | ·/˘···/˘···· |
| From my bed I can hear him, | 7 | ······· |
| And the round notes flutter and tap about the room, | 12 | ····/˘······ |
| And hit against each other, | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| Blurring to unexpected chords. | 8 | /˘··˘/˘· |
| It is very beautiful, | 7 | ··/˘/˘˘ |
| With the little flute-notes all about me, | 10 | ··/˘······ |
| In the darkness. | 4 | ··/˘ |
| In the daytime, | 4 | ··/· |
| The neighbour eats bread and onions with one hand | 11 | ·/˘···/˘··· |
| And copies music with the other. | 9 | ·/˘/˘··/˘ |
| He is fat and has a bald head, | 8 | ········ |
| So I do not look at him, | 7 | ······· |
| But run quickly past his window. | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| There is always the sky to look at, | 9 | ··/······ |
| Or the water in the well! | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| But when night comes and he plays his flute, | 9 | ········· |
| I think of him as a young man, | 8 | ········ |
| With gold seals hanging from his watch, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And a blue coat with silver buttons. | 9 | ·····/˘/˘ |
| As I lie in my bed | 6 | ······ |
| The flute-notes push against my ears and lips, | 10 | ·········· |
| And I go to sleep, dreaming. | 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.