Open Windows
Out of the window a sea of green treesLift their soft boughs like the arms of a dancer,They beckon and call me, "Come out in the sun!"But I cannot answer.
I am alone with Weakness and Pain,Sick abed and June is going,I cannot keep her, she hurries byWith the silver-green of her garments blowing.
Men and women pass in the streetGlad of the shining sapphire weather,But we know more of it than they,Pain and I together.
They are the runners in the sun,Breathless and blinded by the race,But we are watchers in the shadeWho speak with Wonder face to face.
Words in this poem
- beckon v. t.
- To make a significant sign to; hence, to summon, as by a motion of the hand.
- abed adv.
- In bed, or on the bed. [Pref. a- in, on + bed.]
- hurries n.
- A staith or framework from which coal is discharged from cars into vessels.
- breathless a.
- Spent with labor or violent action; out of breath.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Open Windows is in the public domain. This text is taken from Flame and Shadow, Project Gutenberg ebook #591; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Sara Teasdale, Open Windows, in Flame and Shadow (1920), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #591, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/teasdale-flame-shadow/open-windows.html, id L16975.
Form and metre
Open Windows is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 73%). 95% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.6 syllables. 6 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 25% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in trochaic 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.
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 -A-A trees · dancerA · sun · answerA
- 2 -A-A pain · goingA · by · blowingA
- 3 -A-A street · weatherA · they · togetherA
- 4 -A-A sun · raceA · shade · faceA
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 trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Out of the window a sea of green trees | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Lift their soft boughs like the arms of a dancer, | 11 | ·········/˘ |
| They beckon and call me, "Come out in the sun!" | 11 | ·/˘········ |
| But I cannot answer. | 6 | ··/˘/˘ |
| I am alone with Weakness and Pain, | 9 | ··˘/·/˘·· |
| Sick abed and June is going, | 8 | ·˘/···/˘ |
| I cannot keep her, she hurries by | 9 | ·˘/···/˘· |
| With the silver-green of her garments blowing. | 11 | ··/˘···/˘/˘ |
| Men and women pass in the street | 8 | ··/˘···· |
| Glad of the shining sapphire weather, | 9 | ···/˘/˘/˘ |
| But we know more of it than they, | 8 | ········ |
| Pain and I together. | 6 | ···˘/˘ |
| They are the runners in the sun, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Breathless and blinded by the race, | 8 | /˘·/˘··· |
| But we are watchers in the shade | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Who speak with Wonder face to face. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
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.