Ami Green
Not “a youth with hoary head and haggard eye”,But an old man with a smooth skinAnd black hair! I had the face of a boy as long as I lived,And for years a soul that was stiff and bent,In a world which saw me just as a jest,To be hailed familiarly when it chose,And loaded up as a man when it chose,Being neither man nor boy.In truth it was soul as well as bodyWhich never matured, and I say to youThat the much-sought prize of eternal youthIs just arrested growth.
Words in this poem
- hoary a.
- White or whitish."The hoary willows."
- haggard a.
- Wild or intractable; disposed to break away from duty; untamed; as, a haggard or refractory hawk. Shak [F. hagard; of German origin, and prop. meaning, of the hegde or woods, wild, untamed. See Hedge, 1st Haw, and -ard.]
- jest n.
- A deed; an action; a gest. [OE. jeste, geste, deed, action, story, tale, OF. geste, LL. gesta, orig., exploits, neut. pl. from L. gestus, p. p. of gerere to bear, carry, accomplish, perfor]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Ami Green is in the public domain. This text is taken from Spoon River Anthology, Project Gutenberg ebook #1280; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Edgar Lee Masters, Ami Green, in Spoon River Anthology (1915), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1280, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/masters-spoon-river/ami-green.html, id L07911.
Form and metre
Ami Green is 12 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 77%). 94% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.8 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 33% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 -----AA----- eye · skin · lived · bent · jest · choseA · choseA · boy · body · you · youth · growth
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Not “a youth with hoary head and haggard eye”, | 11 | ····/˘··/˘· |
| But an old man with a smooth skin | 8 | ········ |
| And black hair! I had the face of a boy as long as I lived, | 15 | ··············· |
| And for years a soul that was stiff and bent, | 10 | ·········· |
| In a world which saw me just as a jest, | 10 | ·········· |
| To be hailed familiarly when it chose, | 10 | ···/˘˘˘··· |
| And loaded up as a man when it chose, | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Being neither man nor boy. | 7 | /˘/˘··· |
| In truth it was soul as well as body | 10 | ········/˘ |
| Which never matured, and I say to you | 10 | ·/˘˘/····· |
| That the much-sought prize of eternal youth | 10 | ······˘/˘· |
| Is just arrested growth. | 6 | ··˘/˘· |
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.