The Beautiful Toilet
Blue, blue is the grass about the riverAnd the willows have overfilled the close garden.And within, the mistress, in the midmost of her youth,White, white of face, hesitates, passing the door.Slender, she puts forth a slender hand,
And she was a courtezan in the old days,And she has married a sot,Who now goes drunkenly outAnd leaves her too much alone.
By Mei Sheng.B.C. 140.
Words in this poem
- midmost a.
- Middle; middlemost. [OE. middemiste. Cf. Foremost.]
- drunkenly adv.
- In a drunken manner.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Beautiful Toilet is in the public domain. This text is taken from Cathay, Project Gutenberg ebook #50155; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Ezra Pound, The Beautiful Toilet, in Cathay (1915), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #50155, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/pound-cathay/the-beautiful-toilet.html, id L01232.
Form and metre
The Beautiful Toilet is 11 lines in 3 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. 89% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.4 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 18% 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.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Blue, blue is the grass about the river | 10 | ········/˘ |
| And the willows have overfilled the close garden. | 12 | ··/··/˘···/˘ |
| And within, the mistress, in the midmost of her youth, | 13 | ····/˘··/˘··· |
| White, white of face, hesitates, passing the door. | 11 | ····/˘·/˘·· |
| Slender, she puts forth a slender hand, | 9 | /˘····/˘· |
| And she was a courtezan in the old days, | 11 | ··········· |
| And she has married a sot, | 7 | ···/˘·· |
| Who now goes drunkenly out | 7 | ···/˘˘· |
| And leaves her too much alone. | 7 | ·····˘/ |
| By Mei Sheng. | 3 | ··· |
| B.C. 140. | 2 | ·· |
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.