Song of One of the Girls
Here in my heart I am Helen;I'm Aspasia and Hero, at least.I'm Judith, and Jael, and Madame de Staël;I'm Salomé, moon of the East.
Here in my soul I am Sappho;Lady Hamilton am I, as well.In me Récamier vies with Kitty O'Shea,With Dido, and Eve, and poor Nell.
I'm of the glamorous ladiesAt whose beckoning history shook.But you are a man, and see only my pan,So I stay at home with a book.
Words in this poem
- madame n.
- My lady; -- a French title formerly given to ladies of quality; now, in France, given to all married women. [F., fr. ma my (L. mea) + dame dame. See Dame, and cf. Madonna.]
- sappho n.
- Any one of several species of brilliant South American humming birds of the genus Sappho, having very bright-colored and deeply forked tails; -- called also firetail. [See Sapphic.]
- kitty n.
- A kitten; also, a pet name or calling name for the cat.
- shook v. t.
- To pack, as staves, in a shook.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Song of One of the Girls 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, Song of One of the Girls, in Enough Rope (1926), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #68353, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/parker-enough-rope/song-of-one-of-the-girls.html, id L27385.
Form and metre
Song of One of the Girls is 12 lines in 3 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is dactylic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 73%).
See other poems in dactylic 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 helen · leastA · staël · eastA
- 2 -A-A sappho · wellA · o'shea · nellA
- 3 -A-A ladies · shookA · pan · bookA
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 dactylic trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Here in my heart I am Helen; | 8 | ······/˘ |
| I'm Aspasia and Hero, at least. | 9 | ·····/˘·· |
| I'm Judith, and Jael, and Madame de Staël; | 10 | ·/˘···˘/·· |
| I'm Salomé, moon of the East. | 7 | ······· |
| Here in my soul I am Sappho; | 8 | ······/˘ |
| Lady Hamilton am I, as well. | 8 | /˘/˘···· |
| In me Récamier vies with Kitty O'Shea, | 11 | ·······/˘·/ |
| With Dido, and Eve, and poor Nell. | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| I'm of the glamorous ladies | 8 | ···/˘˘/˘ |
| At whose beckoning history shook. | 8 | ··/˘/˘˘· |
| But you are a man, and see only my pan, | 11 | ·······/˘·· |
| So I stay at home with a book. | 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.