Sanary
Her little hot room looked over the bayThrough a stiff palisade of glinting palms,And there she would lie in the heat of the day,Her dark head resting upon her arms,So quiet, so still, she did not seemTo think, to feel, or even to dream.
The shimmering, blinding web of seaHung from the sky, and the spider sunWith busy frightening crueltyCrawled over the sky and spun and spun.She could see it still when she shut her eyes,And the little boats caught in the web like flies.
Down below at this idle hourNobody walked in the dusty streetA scent of dying mimosa flowerLay on the air, but sweet—too sweet.
Words in this poem
- palisade n.
- A strong, long stake, one end of which is set firmly in the ground, and the other is sharpened; also, a fence formed of such stakes set in the ground as a means of defense. [F. palissade, cf. Sp. palizada, It. palizzata, palizzo, LL. palissata; all fr. L. palus a stake, pale. See Pale a stake.]
- shimmering n.
- A gleam or glimmering.
- nobody n.
- No person; no one; not anybody. [No, a. + body.]
- mimosa n.
- A genus of leguminous plants, containing many species, and including the sensitive plants (Mimosa sensitiva, and M. pudica). [NL., fr. Gr. Mime.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sanary 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, Sanary, in Poems (1923), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #59276, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/mansfield-poems/sanary.html, id L27603.
Form and metre
Sanary is 16 lines in 3 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 80%).
See 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 A-A-BB bayA · palms · dayA · arms · seemB · dreamB
- 2 -A-ABB sea · sunA · cruelty · spunA · eyesB · fliesB
- 3 ABAB hourA · streetB · flowerA · sweetB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Her little hot room looked over the bay | 9 | ·/˘······ |
| Through a stiff palisade of glinting palms, | 10 | ····˘/·/˘· |
| And there she would lie in the heat of the day, | 11 | ··········· |
| Her dark head resting upon her arms, | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| So quiet, so still, she did not seem | 8 | ·/······ |
| To think, to feel, or even to dream. | 8 | ·····/·· |
| The shimmering, blinding web of sea | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| Hung from the sky, and the spider sun | 8 | ······/· |
| With busy frightening cruelty | 8 | ·/˘/˘˘/˘ |
| Crawled over the sky and spun and spun. | 8 | ········ |
| She could see it still when she shut her eyes, | 10 | ·········· |
| And the little boats caught in the web like flies. | 11 | ··/˘······· |
| Down below at this idle hour | 9 | ·····/˘/˘ |
| Nobody walked in the dusty street | 9 | /·····/˘· |
| A scent of dying mimosa flower | 9 | ···/˘˘/˘/ |
| Lay on the air, but sweet—too sweet. | 8 | ········ |
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.