Her Mouth
Her mouth is like the mouth of a fine bustThat cannot utter sound, nor breathe, nor kiss,But that had once from Life received all thisWhich shaped its subtle curves, and ever mustFrom fullness of past knowledge dwell alone,A thing apart, a parable in stone.
Words in this poem
- dwell v. i.
- To delay; to linger. [OE. dwellen, dwelien, to err, linger, AS. dwellan to deceive, hinder, delay, dwelian to err; akin to Icel. dvelja to delay, tarry, Sw. dväljas to dwell, Dan. dv]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Her Mouth is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, translated by Jessie Lemont, with an introduction by H.T. (New York: Tobias A. Wright, 1918), Project Gutenberg ebook #38594, the Jessie Lemont translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Rainer Maria Rilke, Her Mouth, in Poems (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #38594, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/rilke-poems-lemont/her-mouth.html, id L27772.
Form and metre
Her Mouth is 6 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABBACC. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%).
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 ABBACC bustA · kissB · thisB · mustA · aloneC · stoneC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Her mouth is like the mouth of a fine bust | 10 | ·········· |
| That cannot utter sound, nor breathe, nor kiss, | 10 | ·/˘/˘····· |
| But that had once from Life received all this | 10 | ······˘/·· |
| Which shaped its subtle curves, and ever must | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| From fullness of past knowledge dwell alone, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘·˘/ |
| A thing apart, a parable in stone. | 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.