Art and Life
When Art goes bounding, lean,Up hill-tops fired greenTo pluck a rose for life.
Life like a broody henCluck-clucks him back again.
But when Art, imbecile,Sits old and chillOn sidings shaven clean,And counts his clusteringDead daisies on a stringWith witless laughter....
Then like a new JillToiling up a hillLife scrambles after.
Words in this poem
- broody a.
- Inclined to brood. Ray.
- witless a.
- Destitute of wit or understanding; wanting thought; hence, indiscreet; not under the guidance of judgment.
- jill n.
- A young woman; a sweetheart. See Gill. Beau. & Fl. [See Gill sweetheart.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Art and Life is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Ghetto, and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #4332; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Lola Ridge, Art and Life, in The Ghetto, and Other Poems (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4332, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/ridge-ghetto/art-and-life.html, id L20906.
Form and metre
Art and Life is 14 lines in 4 stanzas. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%).
See other poems in iambic 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 AA- leanA · greenA · life
- 2 BB henB · againB
- 3 -CA--D imbecile · chillC · cleanA · clustering · string · laughterD
- 4 CCD jillC · hillC · afterD
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| When Art goes bounding, lean, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Up hill-tops fired green | 6 | ···/˘· |
| To pluck a rose for life. | 6 | ······ |
| Life like a broody hen | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Cluck-clucks him back again. | 6 | ····˘/ |
| But when Art, imbecile, | 6 | ···/˘˘ |
| Sits old and chill | 4 | ···· |
| On sidings shaven clean, | 6 | ·/˘/˘· |
| And counts his clustering | 6 | ···/˘˘ |
| Dead daisies on a string | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| With witless laughter.... | 5 | ·/˘/˘ |
| Then like a new Jill | 5 | ····· |
| Toiling up a hill | 5 | /˘··· |
| Life scrambles after. | 5 | ·/˘·· |
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.