Twinkletoes
When the sunShines through the leaves of the apple-tree,When the sunMakes shadows of the leaves of the apple-tree,Then I passOn the grassFrom one leaf to another,From one leaf to its brotherTip-toe, tip-toe!Here I go!
About this text
Twinkletoes 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, Twinkletoes, in When We Were Very Young (1924), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #70271, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/milne-when-we-were-very-young/twinkletoes.html, id L27180.
Form and metre
Twinkletoes is 10 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 60% of the lines. The metre is anapaestic monometer, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 83%).
See other poems in rhyming couplets, other poems in anapaestic monometer.
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 ABABCCDDEE sunA · treeB · sunA · treeB · passC · grassC · anotherD · brotherD · toeE · goE
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 anapaestic monometer. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| When the sun | 3 | ··· |
| Shines through the leaves of the apple-tree, | 9 | ······/˘· |
| When the sun | 3 | ··· |
| Makes shadows of the leaves of the apple-tree, | 11 | ·/······/˘· |
| Then I pass | 3 | ··· |
| On the grass | 3 | ··· |
| From one leaf to another, | 7 | ····˘/˘ |
| From one leaf to its brother | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| Tip-toe, tip-toe! | 4 | ···· |
| Here I go! | 3 | ··· |
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.