To the American People
Will you feast with me, American People?But what have I that shall seem good to you!
On my board are bitter applesAnd honey served on thorns,And in my flagons fluid iron,Hot from the crucibles.
How should such fare entice you!
Words in this poem
- 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,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
To the American People 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, To the American People, in The Ghetto, and Other Poems (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4332, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/ridge-ghetto/to-the-american-people.html, id L20861.
Form and metre
To the American People is 7 lines in 3 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 76%).
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.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Will you feast with me, American People? | 11 | ·····˘/˘˘/˘ |
| But what have I that shall seem good to you! | 10 | ·········· |
| On my board are bitter apples | 8 | ····/˘/˘ |
| And honey served on thorns, | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| And in my flagons fluid iron, | 9 | ·····/˘/˘ |
| Hot from the crucibles. | 6 | ···/˘˘ |
| How should such fare entice you! | 7 | ····˘/· |
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.