Philosophy
If I should labor through daylight and dark,Consecrate, valorous, serious, true,Then on the world I may blazon my mark;And what if I don't, and what if I do?
Words in this poem
- daylight n.
- The light of day as opposed to the darkness of night; the light of the sun, as opposed to that of the moon or to artificial light.
- valorous a.
- Possessing or exhibiting valor; brave; courageous; valiant; intrepid. [Cf. F. valeureux, LL. valorosus.]
- blazon v. t.
- To depict in colors; to display; to exhibit conspicuously; to publish or make public far and wide. [From blazon, n.; confused with 4th blaze: cf. F. blasonner.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Philosophy is in the public domain. This text is taken from Enough Rope: Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #68353; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Dorothy Parker, Philosophy, in Enough Rope (1926), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #68353, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/parker-enough-rope/philosophy.html, id L27378.
Form and metre
Philosophy is 4 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABAB.
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 darkA · trueB · markA · doB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| If I should labor through daylight and dark, | 10 | ···/˘·/··· |
| Consecrate, valorous, serious, true, | 9 | /˘·/˘˘/˘· |
| Then on the world I may blazon my mark; | 10 | ······/˘·· |
| And what if I don't, and what if I do? | 10 | ·········· |
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.