The Homebody
There still are kindly things for me to know,Who am afraid to dream, afraid to feel—This little chair of scrubbed and sturdy deal,This easy book, this fire, sedate and slow.And I shall stay with them, nor cry the woeOf wounds across my breast that do not heal;Nor wish that Beauty drew a duller steel,Since I am sworn to meet her as a foe.
It may be, when the devil’s own time is done,That I shall hear the dropping of the rainAt midnight, and lie quiet in my bed;Or stretch and straighten to the yellow sun;Or face the turning tree, and have no pain;So shall I learn at last my heart is dead.
Words in this poem
- scrubbed a.
- Dwarfed or stunted; scrubby.
- 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,]
- duller n.
- One who, or that which, dulls.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Homebody is in the public domain. This text is taken from Sunset Gun: Poems (Boni & Liveright, 1928), English 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: Dorothy Parker, The Homebody, in Sunset Gun (1928), text of English Wikisource, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/parker-sunset-gun/the-homebody.html, id L27448.
Form and metre
The Homebody is 14 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 ABBAABBA knowA · feelB · dealB · slowA · woeA · healB · steelB · foeA
- 2 ABCABC doneA · rainB · bedC · sunA · painB · deadC
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 iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| There still are kindly things for me to know, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Who am afraid to dream, afraid to feel— | 10 | ··˘/··˘/·· |
| This little chair of scrubbed and sturdy deal, | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| This easy book, this fire, sedate and slow. | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/·· |
| And I shall stay with them, nor cry the woe | 10 | ·········· |
| Of wounds across my breast that do not heal; | 10 | ··˘/······ |
| Nor wish that Beauty drew a duller steel, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Since I am sworn to meet her as a foe. | 10 | ·········· |
| It may be, when the devil’s own time is done, | 11 | ·····/˘···· |
| That I shall hear the dropping of the rain | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| At midnight, and lie quiet in my bed; | 10 | ·/···/˘··· |
| Or stretch and straighten to the yellow sun; | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Or face the turning tree, and have no pain; | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| So shall I learn at last my heart is dead. | 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.