The Snow Man
One must have a mind of winterTo regard the frost and the boughsOf the pine-trees crusted with snow;
And have been cold a long timeTo behold the junipers shagged with ice,The spruces rough in the distant glitter
Of the January sun; and not to thinkOf any misery in the sound of the wind,In the sound of a few leaves,
Which is the sound of the landFull of the same windThat is blowing in the same bare place
For the listener, who listens in the snow,And, nothing himself, beholdsNothing that is not there and the nothing that is.
Words in this poem
- crusted a.
- Incrusted; covered with, or containing, crust; as, old, crusted port wine.
- january n.
- The first month of the year, containing thirty-one days. [L. Januarius, fr. Janus an old Latin deity, the god of the sun and the year, to whom the month of January was sacred; cf. janua a door, Skr. ya to go.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Snow Man is in the public domain. This text is taken from Harmonium, Project Gutenberg ebook #78743; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Wallace Stevens, The Snow Man, in Harmonium (1923), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #78743, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/stevens-harmonium/the-snow-man.html, id L01012.
Form and metre
The Snow Man is 15 lines in 5 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 74%). 91% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.7 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 60% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic tetrameter.
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| One must have a mind of winter | 8 | ······/˘ |
| To regard the frost and the boughs | 8 | ·˘/····· |
| Of the pine-trees crusted with snow; | 8 | ····/˘·· |
| And have been cold a long time | 7 | ······· |
| To behold the junipers shagged with ice, | 10 | ·˘/·/˘˘··· |
| The spruces rough in the distant glitter | 10 | ·/˘···/˘/˘ |
| Of the January sun; and not to think | 11 | ··/˘·˘····· |
| Of any misery in the sound of the wind, | 11 | ·/˘/˘······ |
| In the sound of a few leaves, | 7 | ······· |
| Which is the sound of the land | 7 | ······· |
| Full of the same wind | 5 | ····· |
| That is blowing in the same bare place | 9 | ··/˘····· |
| For the listener, who listens in the snow, | 10 | ··/˘·/˘··· |
| And, nothing himself, beholds | 7 | ·/˘˘/˘/ |
| Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is. | 12 | /˘······/˘·· |
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.