Analysis of Schizophrenic
Robert William Service 1874 – 1958
Each morning as I catch my bus,
A-fearing I'll be late,
I think: there are in all of us
Two folks quite separate;
As one I greet the office staff
With grim, official mien;
The other's when I belly-laugh,
And Home Sweet Home's the scene.
I've half a hundred men to boss,
And take my job to heart;
You'll never find me at a loss,
So well I play my part.
My voice is hard, my eye is cold,
My mouth is grimly set;
They all consider me, I'm told,
A "bloody martinet."
But when I reach my home at night
I'm happy as a boy;
My kiddies kiss me with delight,
And dance a jig of joy.
I slip into my oldest cloths,
My lines of care uncrease;
I mow the lawn, unhook the hose,
And glow with garden peace.
It's then I wonder which I am,
the boss with hard-boiled eye,
Or just the gay don't care-a-damn
Go-lucky garden guy?
Am I the starchy front who rants
As round his weight he throws,
or just old Pop with patchy pants,
Who sings and sniffs a rose?
Scheme | ABABCDCD XEXEFXFB GHGHXAIX JKJKAIXI |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11011111 010111 11110111 11110 11110101 110101 01011101 011101 11010111 011111 11011101 111111 11111111 111101 11010111 0101 11111111 110101 11011101 010111 11011101 11111 11010101 011101 11110111 011111 11011101 110101 11010111 111111 11111101 110101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 913 |
Words | 191 |
Sentences | 8 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 32 |
Letters per line (avg) | 22 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 175 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 47 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 14, 2023
- 59 sec read
- 55 Views
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"Schizophrenic" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/32421/schizophrenic>.
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