Analysis of Bad Decision
The faded photograph
now held in a pewter antique frame,
is all I have left of that summer of 1982.
You are standing next to
your new red bicycle
with a melting popsicle in your hand.
Earlier that day we splashed our way
though neighbourhood puddles.
climbed stately maples
our feet caked with drying mud.
On limber legs we peddled our
bikes up the steep hills just for fun.
Our faces flushed with
youthful exuberance
we ran and did cartwheels
across the front yard.
Dusty sunbeams splattered
our cheeks with freckles.
We gathered summer’s ripeness
with gleeful hearts.
That would be the last summer
that you were able to run with me
gathering childhood dreams.
That fall when the leaves rustled
and the rain came pouring down
our lives would be changed forever.
I still see you lying beside that
crumpled red bike and some old man
trying to explain he really hadn’t
had that much to drink.
So many lives changed in one minute
and one bad decision.
Scheme | ABCDEFGHHIJKLMNOPHHQJRSDTJUVDWXK |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 01010 110010011 1111111101 111011 111100 1010100011 1001111101 1110 11010 10111101 110111010 11011111 101011 100100 11011 01011 10110 101110 110101 1101 1110110 110101111 10011 111011 0011101 101111010 111110011 10110111 101011101 11111 110110110 011010 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 921 |
Words | 169 |
Sentences | 13 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 32 |
Lines Amount | 32 |
Letters per line (avg) | 24 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 765 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 169 |
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Submitted on May 01, 2011
Modified on March 27, 2023
- 50 sec read
- 7 Views
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"Bad Decision" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 1 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/66434/bad-decision>.
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