Storm Ending
Thunder blossoms gorgeously above our heads,Great, hollow, bell-like flowers,Rumbling in the wind,Stretching clappers to strike our ears ..Full-lipped flowersBitten by the sunBleeding rainDripping rain like golden honey—And the sweet earth flying from the thunder.
Words in this poem
- rumbling
- a. & n. from Rumble, v. i.
- dripping n.
- A falling in drops, or the sound so made.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Storm Ending is in the public domain. This text is taken from Cane, Project Gutenberg ebook #60093; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Jean Toomer, Storm Ending, in Cane (1923), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #60093, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/toomer-cane/storm-ending.html, id L01574.
Form and metre
Storm Ending is 9 lines in a single stanza. 94% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.0 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 33% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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---- heads · flowersA · wind · ears · flowersA · sun · rain · honey · thunder
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Thunder blossoms gorgeously above our heads, | 11 | /˘/˘·····/· |
| Great, hollow, bell-like flowers, | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
| Rumbling in the wind, | 6 | /˘˘··· |
| Stretching clappers to strike our ears .. | 9 | /˘/˘··/˘· |
| Full-lipped flowers | 4 | ··/˘ |
| Bitten by the sun | 5 | /˘··· |
| Bleeding rain | 3 | /˘· |
| Dripping rain like golden honey— | 8 | /˘··/˘/˘ |
| And the sweet earth flying from the thunder. | 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.