Analysis of Window Shopper
I stood before a candy shop
Which with a Christmas radiance shone;
I saw my parents pass and stop
To grin at me and then go on.
The sweets were heaped in gleamy rows;
On each I feasted - what a game!
Against the glass with flatted nose,
Gulping my spittle as it came;
So still I stood, and stared and dreamed,
Savouring sweetness with my eyes,
Devouring dainties till it seemed
My candy shop was paradise.
I had, I think, but five years old,
And though three-score and ten have passed,
I still recall the craintive cold,
The grimy street, the gritty blast;
And how I stared into that shop,
Its gifts so near and yet so far,
Of marzipan and toffee drop,
Of chocolate and walnut bar;
Imagining what I would buy
Amid delights so rich and rare . . .
The glass was misted with my sigh:
"If just one penny Pop could spare!"
And then when I went home to tea
Of bread and butter sparsely spread,
Oh, how my parents twitted me:
"You stood for full an hour," they said.
"We saw you as we passed again;
Your eyes upon the sweets were glued;
Your nose was flattened to the pane,
Like someone hypnotized you stood."
But when they laughed as at a joke,
A bitterness I could not stem
Within my little heart awoke. . . .
Oh, I have long forgiven them;
For though I know they did no own
Pennies to spare, they might, it seems
More understanding love have shown
More sympathy for those vain dreams,
Which make of me with wistful gaze
God's Window Shopper all days.
Scheme | ABAXCDCDEXEX FGFGAHAHIJIJ KLKLXXXXMNMNBOBOPP |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11010101 110101001 11110101 11110111 0101011 11110101 0101111 10110111 11110101 110111 01001111 1101110 11111111 01110111 111011 01010101 01110111 11110111 110101 110011 01001111 01011101 0111111 11110111 01111111 11010101 1111011 111111011 11111101 11010101 11110101 111011 11111101 01001111 01110101 11110101 11111111 10111111 1010111 11001111 11111101 1101011 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,414 |
Words | 276 |
Sentences | 15 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 12, 12, 18 |
Lines Amount | 42 |
Letters per line (avg) | 27 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 372 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 92 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:22 min read
- 71 Views
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"Window Shopper" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 30 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/32752/window-shopper>.
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