Analysis of Portrait of a Lady
William Carlos Williams 1883 (Rutherford) – 1963 (Rutherford)
Your thighs are appletrees
whose blossoms touch the sky.
Which sky? The sky
where Watteau hung a lady's
slipper. Your knees
are a southern breeze -- or
a gust of snow. Agh! what
sort of man was Fragonard?
-- As if that answered
anything. -- Ah, yes. Below
the knees, since the tune
drops that way, it is
one of those white summer days,
the tall grass of your ankles
flickers upon the shore --
Which shore? --
the sand clings to my lips --
Which shore?
Agh, petals maybe. How
should I know?
Which shore? Which shore?
-- the petals from some hidden
appletree -- Which shore?
I said petals from an appletree.
Scheme | abbaacdeefgaaacCaChfcicc |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111 110101 1101 111010 1011 101011 011111 1111100 11110 101101 01101 11111 1111101 0111110 100101 11 011111 11 110101 111 1111 0101110 111 1110111 |
Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
Characters | 590 |
Words | 116 |
Sentences | 17 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 24 |
Lines Amount | 24 |
Letters per line (avg) | 19 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 454 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 114 |
Font size:
Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 03, 2023
- 35 sec read
- 846 Views
Citation
Use the citation below to add this poem analysis to your bibliography:
Style:MLAChicagoAPA
"Portrait of a Lady" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 3 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/39685/portrait-of-a-lady>.
Discuss this William Carlos Williams poem analysis with the community:
Report Comment
We're doing our best to make sure our content is useful, accurate and safe.
If by any chance you spot an inappropriate comment while navigating through our website please use this form to let us know, and we'll take care of it shortly.
Attachment
You need to be logged in to favorite.
Log In