Aner Clute
Over and over they used to ask me,While buying the wine or the beer,In Peoria first, and later in Chicago,Denver, Frisco, New York, wherever I livedHow I happened to lead the life,And what was the start of it.Well, I told them a silk dress,And a promise of marriage from a rich man—(It was Lucius Atherton).But that was not really it at all.Suppose a boy steals an appleFrom the tray at the grocery store,And they all begin to call him a thief,The editor, minister, judge, and all the people—“A thief,” “a thief,” “a thief,” wherever he goesAnd he can’t get work, and he can’t get breadWithout stealing it, why the boy will steal.It’s the way the people regard the theft of the appleThat makes the boy what he is.
Words in this poem
- wherever adv.
- At or in whatever place; wheresoever.
- grocery n.
- The commodities sold by grocers, as tea, coffee, spices, etc.; -- in the United States almost always in the plural form, in this sense. [F. grosserie wholesale. See Grocer.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Aner Clute 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, Aner Clute, in Spoon River Anthology (1915), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1280, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/masters-spoon-river/aner-clute.html, id L07789.
Form and metre
Aner Clute is 19 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 72%). 84% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.6 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 26% 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.
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 -------AABB--B--BB- me · beer · chicago · lived · life · it · dress · manA · athertonA · allB · appleB · store · thief · peopleB · goes · bread · stealB · appleB · is
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Over and over they used to ask me, | 10 | ·········· |
| While buying the wine or the beer, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| In Peoria first, and later in Chicago, | 13 | ·˘/˘˘··/˘·˘/· |
| Denver, Frisco, New York, wherever I lived | 11 | /˘/˘··˘/˘·· |
| How I happened to lead the life, | 8 | ··/˘···· |
| And what was the start of it. | 7 | ······· |
| Well, I told them a silk dress, | 7 | ······· |
| And a promise of marriage from a rich man— | 11 | ··/˘·/˘···· |
| (It was Lucius Atherton). | 7 | ··/˘/˘˘ |
| But that was not really it at all. | 9 | ····/˘··· |
| Suppose a boy steals an apple | 8 | ˘/····/˘ |
| From the tray at the grocery store, | 9 | ·····/˘˘· |
| And they all begin to call him a thief, | 10 | ···˘/····· |
| The editor, minister, judge, and all the people— | 13 | ·/˘˘/˘˘····/˘ |
| “A thief,” “a thief,” “a thief,” wherever he goes | 11 | ······˘/˘·· |
| And he can’t get work, and he can’t get bread | 10 | ·········· |
| Without stealing it, why the boy will steal. | 10 | ··/˘······ |
| It’s the way the people regard the theft of the apple | 14 | ····/˘˘/····/˘ |
| That makes the boy what he is. | 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.