A Hand-Mirror
Hold it up sternly--see this it sends back, (who is it? is it you?)Outside fair costume, within ashes and filth,No more a flashing eye, no more a sonorous voice or springy step,Now some slave’s eye, voice, hands, step,A drunkard’s breath, unwholesome eater’s face, venerealee’s flesh,Lungs rotting away piecemeal, stomach sour and cankerous,Joints rheumatic, bowels clogged with abomination,Blood circulating dark and poisonous streams,Words babble, hearing and touch callous,No brain, no heart left, no magnetism of sex;Such from one look in this looking-glass ere you go hence,Such a result so soon--and from such a beginning!
Words in this poem
- sternly adv.
- In a stern manner.
- piecemeal adv.
- In pieces; in parts or fragments. [OE. pecemele; pece a piece + AS. m, dat. pl. of m part. See Meal a portion.]
- cankerous a.
- Affecting like a canker.
- rheumatic a.
- Derived from, or having the character of, rheum; rheumic. [Gr. rheumaticus, F. rhumatique. See Rheum, Rheumatism.]
- abomination n.
- The feeling of extreme disgust and hatred; abhorrence; detestation; loathing; as, he holds tobacco in abomination. [OE. abominacioun, -cion, F. abominatio. See Abominate.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
A Hand-Mirror is in the public domain. This text is taken from Leaves of Grass, Project Gutenberg ebook #1322; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Walt Whitman, A Hand-Mirror, in Leaves of Grass (1855–1892), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1322, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/whitman-leaves/a-hand-mirror.html, id L03923.
Form and metre
A Hand-Mirror is 12 lines in a single stanza. 80% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 12.7 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
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 --AA-B--B--- you · filth · stepA · stepA · flesh · cankerousB · abomination · streams · callousB · sex · hence · beginning
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Hold it up sternly--see this it sends back, (who is it? is it you?) | 16 | ···/˘··········· |
| Outside fair costume, within ashes and filth, | 11 | //·˘/··/˘·· |
| No more a flashing eye, no more a sonorous voice or springy step, | 17 | ···/˘····/˘˘··/˘· |
| Now some slave’s eye, voice, hands, step, | 7 | ······· |
| A drunkard’s breath, unwholesome eater’s face, venerealee’s flesh, | 15 | ·/˘·····/˘····· |
| Lungs rotting away piecemeal, stomach sour and cankerous, | 15 | ·/˘˘//·/˘/˘·/˘˘ |
| Joints rheumatic, bowels clogged with abomination, | 13 | ·˘/˘/˘··˘·˘/˘ |
| Blood circulating dark and poisonous streams, | 11 | ·/˘·˘··/˘˘· |
| Words babble, hearing and touch callous, | 9 | ·/˘/˘··/˘ |
| No brain, no heart left, no magnetism of sex; | 12 | ······/˘·˘·· |
| Such from one look in this looking-glass ere you go hence, | 13 | ······/˘····· |
| Such a result so soon--and from such a beginning! | 13 | ··˘/······˘/˘ |
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.