Complaint
They call me and I goIt is a frozen roadpast midnight, a dustof snow caughtin the rigid wheeltracks.The door opens.I smile, enter andshake off the cold.Here is a great womanon her side in the bed.She is sick,perhaps vomiting,perhaps laboringto give birth toa tenth child. Joy! Joy!Night is a roomdarkened for lovers,through the jalousies the sunhas sent one gold needle!I pick the hair from her eyesand watch her miserywith compassion.
Words in this poem
- laboring a.
- That labors; performing labor; esp., performing coarse, heavy work, not requiring skill also, set apart for labor; as, laboring days.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Complaint is in the public domain. This text is taken from Sour Grapes: A Book of Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #35667; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: William Carlos Williams, Complaint, in Sour Grapes (1921), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #35667, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/williams-sour-grapes/complaint.html, id L01160.
Form and metre
Complaint is 22 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 75%). 93% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 5.0 syllables. 8 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 55% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic trimeter.
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 ----------------AB-A-B go · road · dust · caught · wheeltracks · opens · and · cold · woman · bed · sick · vomiting · laboring · to · joy · room · loversA · sunB · needle · eyesA · misery · compassionB
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| They call me and I go | 6 | ······ |
| It is a frozen road | 6 | ···/˘· |
| past midnight, a dust | 5 | ·/··· |
| of snow caught | 3 | ··· |
| in the rigid wheeltracks. | 6 | ··/˘·· |
| The door opens. | 4 | ··/˘ |
| I smile, enter and | 5 | ··/˘· |
| shake off the cold. | 4 | ···· |
| Here is a great woman | 6 | ····/˘ |
| on her side in the bed. | 6 | ······ |
| She is sick, | 3 | ··· |
| perhaps vomiting, | 5 | ˘//˘˘ |
| perhaps laboring | 5 | ˘//˘˘ |
| to give birth to | 4 | ···· |
| a tenth child. Joy! Joy! | 5 | ····· |
| Night is a room | 4 | ···· |
| darkened for lovers, | 5 | /˘·/˘ |
| through the jalousies the sun | 6 | ······ |
| has sent one gold needle! | 6 | ····/˘ |
| I pick the hair from her eyes | 7 | ······· |
| and watch her misery | 6 | ···/˘˘ |
| with compassion. | 4 | ·˘/˘ |
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.