Songs of My City: I. In a Latticed Balcony
How shall I feed thee, Beloved?On golden-red honey and fruit.How shall I please thee, Beloved?With th' voice of the cymbal and lute.
How shall I garland thy tresses?With pearls from the jessamine close.How shall I perfume thy fingers?With th' soul of the keora and rose.
How shall I deck thee, O Dearest?In hues of the peacock and dove.How shall I woo thee, O Dearest?With the delicate silence of love.
Words in this poem
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- cymbal n.
- A musical instrument used by the ancients. It is supposed to have been similar to the modern kettle drum, though perhaps smaller. [OE. cimbale, simbale, OF. cimbale, F. cymbale, L. cymbalum, fr. Gr. kubha pot. Cf. Chime.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Songs of My City: I. In a Latticed Balcony is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Bird of Time: Songs of Life, Death & the Spring (London: William Heinemann; New York: John Lane Company, 1912), Wikisource; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Sarojini Naidu, Songs of My City: I. In a Latticed Balcony, in The Bird of Time: Songs of Life, Death & the Spring (1912), text of Wikisource, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/naidu-bird-of-time/songs-of-my-city-i-in-a-latticed-balcony.html, id L27539.
Form and metre
Songs of My City: I. In a Latticed Balcony is 12 lines in 3 stanzas of 4 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABAB, complete in 2 of its 3 stanzas. The metre is anapaestic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 84%).
See other poems in anapaestic 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 ABAB belovedA · fruitB · belovedA · luteB
- 2 AAAA tressesA · closeA · fingersA · roseA
- 3 ABAB dearestA · doveB · dearestA · loveB
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| How shall I feed thee, Beloved? | 8 | ·····˘/˘ |
| On golden-red honey and fruit. | 8 | ·/˘·/˘·· |
| How shall I please thee, Beloved? | 8 | ·····˘/˘ |
| With th' voice of the cymbal and lute. | 8 | ····/˘·· |
| How shall I garland thy tresses? | 8 | ···/˘·/˘ |
| With pearls from the jessamine close. | 8 | ····/˘˘· |
| How shall I perfume thy fingers? | 8 | ···˘/·/˘ |
| With th' soul of the keora and rose. | 8 | ········ |
| How shall I deck thee, O Dearest? | 8 | ······/˘ |
| In hues of the peacock and dove. | 8 | ····/··· |
| How shall I woo thee, O Dearest? | 8 | ······/˘ |
| With the delicate silence of love. | 8 | ··/˘/˘·· |
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.