Analysis of The Following Pair

Ambrose Bierce 1842 (Meigs County) – 1914 (Chihuahua)



O very remarkable mortal,
What food is engaging your jaws
And staining with amber their portal?
'It's 'baccy I chaws.'

And why do you sway in your walking,
To right and left many degrees,
And hitch up your trousers when talking?
'I follers the seas.'

Great indolent shark in the rollers,
Is ''baccy,' too, one of your faults?
You, too, display maculate molars.
'I dines upon salts.'

Strange diet!-intestinal pain it
Is commonly given to nip.
And how can you ever obtain it?
'I follers the ship.'


Scheme ABAB CDCD XEBE FGFG
Poetic Form Quatrain 
Metre 110010010 11101011 010110110 1111 011110110 11011001 011110110 1101 110010010 1111111 110111 11011 110010011 11001011 011110011 1101
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 488
Words 95
Sentences 12
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4
Lines Amount 16
Letters per line (avg) 24
Words per line (avg) 5
Letters per stanza (avg) 94
Words per stanza (avg) 22
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

27 sec read
38

Ambrose Bierce

Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist, and satirist. more…

All Ambrose Bierce poems | Ambrose Bierce Books

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