Me Imperturbe
Me imperturbe, standing at ease in Nature,Master of all or mistress of all, aplomb in the midst of irrational things,Imbued as they, passive, receptive, silent as they,Finding my occupation, poverty, notoriety, foibles, crimes, lessimportant than I thought,Me toward the Mexican sea, or in the Mannahatta or the Tennessee,or far north or inland,A river man, or a man of the woods or of any farm-life of theseStates or of the coast, or the lakes or Kanada,Me wherever my life is lived, O to be self-balanced for contingencies,To confront night, storms, hunger, ridicule, accidents, rebuffs, asthe trees and animals do.
Words in this poem
- aplomb n.
- Assurance of manner or of action; self-possession. [F., lit. perpendicularity; plomb lead. See Plumb.]
- wherever adv.
- At or in whatever place; wheresoever.
- confront v. t.
- To stand facing or in front of; to face; esp. to face hostilely; to oppose with firmness.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Me Imperturbe 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, Me Imperturbe, in Leaves of Grass (1855–1892), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1322, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/whitman-leaves/me-imperturbe.html, id L03837.
Form and metre
Me Imperturbe is 12 lines in a single stanza. 73% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 13.9 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 25% 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-AA- nature · things · they · less · thought · tennessee · inland · theseA · kanada · contingenciesA · asA · do
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Me imperturbe, standing at ease in Nature, | 11 | ····/˘···/˘ |
| Master of all or mistress of all, aplomb in the midst of irrational things, | 20 | /˘···/˘··˘/····˘/˘˘· |
| Imbued as they, passive, receptive, silent as they, | 13 | ˘/··/˘˘/˘/˘·· |
| Finding my occupation, poverty, notoriety, foibles, crimes, less | 19 | /˘··˘/˘/˘˘·˘/˘˘/˘·· |
| important than I thought, | 6 | ˘/˘··· |
| Me toward the Mexican sea, or in the Mannahatta or the Tennessee, | 20 | ····/˘˘···········˘/ |
| or far north or inland, | 6 | ····/· |
| A river man, or a man of the woods or of any farm-life of these | 18 | ·/˘·········/˘···· |
| States or of the coast, or the lakes or Kanada, | 12 | ············ |
| Me wherever my life is lived, O to be self-balanced for contingencies, | 19 | ·˘/˘········/˘·˘/˘˘ |
| To confront night, storms, hunger, ridicule, accidents, rebuffs, as | 16 | ·˘/··/˘/˘·/˘˘˘/· |
| the trees and animals do. | 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.