Reinforcements
The vestibule to experience is not tobe exalted into epic grandeur. These men are goingto their work with this idea, advancing like a school of fishthrough
still water—waiting to change the course or dismissthe idea of movement, till forced to. The words of the Greeksring in our ears, but they are vain in comparison with a sight likethis.
About this text
Reinforcements is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #62833; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Marianne Moore, Reinforcements, in Poems (1921), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #62833, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/moore-poems/reinforcements.html, id L02625.
Form and metre
Reinforcements is 8 lines in 2 stanzas of 4 lines each. 71% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 11.2 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 88% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 toA · going · fish · throughA
- 2 A--A dismissA · greeks · like · thisA
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| The vestibule to experience is not to | 12 | ·/˘··˘/˘˘··· |
| be exalted into epic grandeur. These men are going | 15 | ·˘/˘··/˘˘/···/˘ |
| to their work with this idea, advancing like a school of fish | 16 | ·····˘/˘˘/˘····· |
| through | 1 | · |
| still water—waiting to change the course or dismiss | 12 | ·/˘/˘·····˘/ |
| the idea of movement, till forced to. The words of the Greeks | 15 | ·˘/˘·/˘········ |
| ring in our ears, but they are vain in comparison with a sight like | 18 | ··/˘······˘/˘˘···· |
| this. | 1 | · |
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.