Analysis of Boon Soul
Robert William Service 1874 – 1958
Behold! I'm old; my hair is white;
My eighty years are in the offing,
And sitting by the fire to-night
I sip a grog to ease my coughing.
It's true I'm raucous as a rook,
But feeling bibulously "bardy,"
These lines I'm scribbling in a book:
The verse complete of Thomas Hardy.
Although to-day he's read by few,
Him have I loved beyond all measure;
So here to-night I riffle through
His pages with the oldtime pleasure;
And with this book upon my knee,
(To-day so woefully neglected)
I muse and think how soon I'll be
Myself among the Great Rejected.
Yet as these lines with zest I write,
Although the hour for me is tardy,
I think: "Of all the world to-night
'Tis I alone am reading Hardy";
And now to me he seems so nigh
I feel I commune with his spirit,
And as none love him more than I,
Thereby I gain a modest merit.
Oh Brother Thomas, glad I'll be,
Though all the world may pass unheeding,
If some greybeard con over me,
As I to-night your rhymes are reading;
Saying: "Old Bastard, you and I
By sin are knit in mind and body. . . ."
So ere to hit the hay I hie
Your ghost I'll toast in midnight toddy.
Scheme | ABABCACD EFEFDXDX ADADGHGH DBDBGDXA |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 01111111 110110010 010101011 110111110 11110101 11011 111100001 010111010 1111111 111101110 11111101 11010110 01110111 111100010 11011111 10101010 11111111 101011110 11110111 110111010 01111111 111101110 01111111 111101010 11010111 1101111 1111101 111111110 10110101 111101010 11110111 1111011 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,085 |
Words | 217 |
Sentences | 11 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 32 |
Letters per line (avg) | 26 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 209 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 54 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:06 min read
- 53 Views
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"Boon Soul" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 13 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/32027/boon-soul>.
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