A Little Boy’s Dream
To and fro, to and froIn my little boat I goSailing far across the seaAll alone, just little me.And the sea is big and strongAnd the journey very long.To and fro, to and froIn my little boat I go.
Sea and sky, sea and sky,Quietly on the deck I lie,Having just a little rest.I have really done my bestIn an awful pirate fight,But we captured them all right.Sea and sky, sea and sky,Quietly on the deck I lie
Far away, far awayFrom my home and from my play,On a journey without endOnly with the sea for friendAnd the fishes in the sea.But they swim away from meFar away, far awayFrom my home and from my play.
Then he cried “O Mother dear.”And he woke and sat upright,They were in the rocking chair,Mother’s arms around him—tight.
About this text
A Little Boy’s Dream is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #59276; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Katherine Mansfield, A Little Boy’s Dream, in Poems (1923), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #59276, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/mansfield-poems/a-little-boy-s-dream.html, id L27621.
Form and metre
A Little Boy’s Dream is 28 lines in 4 stanzas. The rhyme scheme is AABBCCAA, complete in 3 of its 4 stanzas. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%).
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 AABBCCAA froA · goA · seaB · meB · strongC · longC · froA · goA
- 2 AABBCCAA skyA · lieA · restB · bestB · fightC · rightC · skyA · lieA
- 3 AABBCCAA awayA · playA · endB · friendB · seaC · meC · awayA · playA
- 4 ABAB dearA · uprightB · chairA · tightB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| To and fro, to and fro | 6 | ······ |
| In my little boat I go | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Sailing far across the sea | 7 | /˘·˘/·· |
| All alone, just little me. | 7 | ·˘/·/˘· |
| And the sea is big and strong | 7 | ······· |
| And the journey very long. | 7 | ··/˘/˘· |
| To and fro, to and fro | 6 | ······ |
| In my little boat I go. | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Sea and sky, sea and sky, | 6 | ······ |
| Quietly on the deck I lie, | 8 | /˘˘····· |
| Having just a little rest. | 7 | /˘··/˘· |
| I have really done my best | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| In an awful pirate fight, | 7 | ··/˘/˘· |
| But we captured them all right. | 8 | ··/˘˘··· |
| Sea and sky, sea and sky, | 6 | ······ |
| Quietly on the deck I lie | 8 | /˘˘····· |
| Far away, far away | 6 | ·˘/·˘/ |
| From my home and from my play, | 7 | ······· |
| On a journey without end | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Only with the sea for friend | 7 | /˘····· |
| And the fishes in the sea. | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| But they swim away from me | 7 | ···˘/·· |
| Far away, far away | 6 | ·˘/·˘/ |
| From my home and from my play. | 7 | ······· |
| Then he cried “O Mother dear.” | 7 | ····/˘· |
| And he woke and sat upright, | 7 | ·····˘/ |
| They were in the rocking chair, | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Mother’s arms around him—tight. | 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.