For McClure's Magazine
The clam that once, on Jersey's banks,Was like the man who dug it, free,Now slave-like thro' the market clanksIn chains of corporate tyranny.
The Standard Fish-Trust of New YorkHolds every clam-bank in control;And like base Beef and menial Pork,The free-born Clam has lost its soul.
No more the bivalve treads the sandsIn freedom's rapture, free from guilt:It follows now the harsh commandsOf Morgiman and Rockabilt.
Rise, freemen, rise! Your wrath is just!Call on the Sherman Act to damThe floods of this devouring Trust,And liberate the fettered Clam.
Words in this poem
- fettered a.
- Seeming as if fettered, as the feet pf certain animals which bend backward, and appear unfit for walking.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
For McClure's Magazine is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Henry Van Dyke, Project Gutenberg ebook #16229; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Henry Van Dyke, For McClure's Magazine, in The Poems of Henry Van Dyke (1925), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #16229, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/van-dyke-poems/for-mcclure-s-magazine.html, id L22992.
Form and metre
For McClure's Magazine is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABAB, complete in 3 of its 4 stanzas. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
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.
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.
- 2 ABAB yorkA · controlB · porkA · soulB
- 3 ABAB sandsA · guiltB · commandsA · rockabiltB
- 4 ABAB justA · damB · trustA · clamB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| The clam that once, on Jersey's banks, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Was like the man who dug it, free, | 8 | ········ |
| Now slave-like thro' the market clanks | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| In chains of corporate tyranny. | 9 | ···/˘˘/˘˘ |
| The Standard Fish-Trust of New York | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Holds every clam-bank in control; | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| And like base Beef and menial Pork, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| The free-born Clam has lost its soul. | 8 | ········ |
| No more the bivalve treads the sands | 8 | ···/···· |
| In freedom's rapture, free from guilt: | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| It follows now the harsh commands | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| Of Morgiman and Rockabilt. | 8 | ········ |
| Rise, freemen, rise! Your wrath is just! | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Call on the Sherman Act to dam | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The floods of this devouring Trust, | 8 | ····˘/˘· |
| And liberate the fettered Clam. | 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.