At Home
I want a soldier(A soldier in a busby),I want a soldier to come and play with me.I’d give him cream-cakes(Big ones, sugar ones),I’d give him cream-cakes and cream for his tea.
I want a soldier(A tall one, a red one),I want a soldier who plays on the drum.Daddy’s going to get one(He’s written to the shopman)Daddy’s going to get one as soon as he can come.
Words in this poem
- daddy n.
- Diminutive of Dad.
- shopman n.
- A shopkeeper; a retailer.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
At Home is in the public domain. This text is taken from When We Were Very Young, Project Gutenberg ebook #70271; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: A. A. Milne, At Home, in When We Were Very Young (1924), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #70271, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/milne-when-we-were-very-young/at-home.html, id L27200.
Form and metre
At Home is 12 lines in 2 stanzas of 6 lines each. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 85%).
See other poems in iambic trimeter.
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 soldier · busby · meA · cakes · ones · teaA
- 2 -ABA-B soldier · oneA · drumB · oneA · shopman · comeB
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| I want a soldier | 5 | ···/˘ |
| (A soldier in a busby), | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
| I want a soldier to come and play with me. | 11 | ···/˘······ |
| I’d give him cream-cakes | 5 | ····· |
| (Big ones, sugar ones), | 5 | ··/˘· |
| I’d give him cream-cakes and cream for his tea. | 10 | ·········· |
| I want a soldier | 5 | ···/˘ |
| (A tall one, a red one), | 6 | ······ |
| I want a soldier who plays on the drum. | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Daddy’s going to get one | 7 | /˘/˘··· |
| (He’s written to the shopman) | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
| Daddy’s going to get one as soon as he can come. | 12 | /˘/········· |
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.