Delicate Cluster
Delicate cluster! flag of teeming life!Covering all my lands--all my seashores lining!Flag of death! (how I watch’d you through the smoke of battle pressing!How I heard you flap and rustle, cloth defiant!)Flag cerulean--sunny flag, with the orbs of night dappled!Ah my silvery beauty--ah my woolly white and crimson!Ah to sing the song of you, my matron mighty!My sacred one, my mother.
Words in this poem
- teeming a.
- Prolific; productive.
- rustle v. i.
- To make a quick succession of small sounds, like the rubbing or moving of silk cloth or dry leaves. [AS. hristlan to rustle; or cf. Sw. rusta to stir, make a riot, or E. rush, v.]
- defiant a.
- Full of defiance; bold; insolent; as, a defiant spirit or act. [Cf. F. défiant, p. pr. of défier. See Defy.]
- cerulean a.
- Sky-colored; blue; azure. [L. caeruleus.]
- sunny a.
- Of or pertaining to the sun; proceeding from, or resembling the sun; hence, shining; bright; brilliant; radiant.
- dappled a.
- Marked with spots of different shades of color; spotted; variegated; as, a dapple horse.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Delicate Cluster 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, Delicate Cluster, in Leaves of Grass (1855–1892), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1322, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/whitman-leaves/delicate-cluster.html, id L03969.
Form and metre
Delicate Cluster is 8 lines in a single verse paragraph. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. 85% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 12.1 syllables. 6 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.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Delicate cluster! flag of teeming life! | 10 | /˘˘/˘··/˘· |
| Covering all my lands--all my seashores lining! | 12 | /˘˘·····/·/˘ |
| Flag of death! (how I watch’d you through the smoke of battle pressing! | 15 | ···········/˘/˘ |
| How I heard you flap and rustle, cloth defiant!) | 12 | ······/˘·˘/˘ |
| Flag cerulean--sunny flag, with the orbs of night dappled! | 14 | ·˘/˘˘/˘······· |
| Ah my silvery beauty--ah my woolly white and crimson! | 15 | ··/˘˘/˘··/˘··/˘ |
| Ah to sing the song of you, my matron mighty! | 12 | ········/˘/˘ |
| My sacred one, my mother. | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
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.