Analysis of My Friends
The man above was a murderer, the man below was a thief;
And I lay there in the bunk between, ailing beyond belief;
A weary armful of skin and bone, wasted with pain and grief.
My feet were froze, and the lifeless toes were purple and green and gray;
The little flesh that clung to my bones, you could punch it in holes like clay;
The skin on my gums was a sullen black, and slowly peeling away.
I was sure enough in a direful fix, and often I wondered why
They did not take the chance that was left and leave me alone to die,
Or finish me off with a dose of dope--so utterly lost was I.
But no; they brewed me the green-spruce tea, and nursed me there like a child;
And the homicide he was good to me, and bathed my sores and smiled;
And the thief he starved that I might be fed, and his eyes were kind and mild.
Yet they were woefully wicked men, and often at night in pain
I heard the murderer speak of his deed and dream it over again;
I heard the poor thief sorrowing for the dead self he had slain.
I'll never forget that bitter dawn, so evil, askew and gray,
When they wrapped me round in the skins of beasts and they bore me to a sleigh,
And we started out with the nearest post an hundred miles away.
I'll never forget the trail they broke, with its tense, unuttered woe;
And the crunch, crunch, crunch as their snowshoes sank through the crust of the hollow snow;
And my breath would fail, and every beat of my heart was like a blow.
And oftentimes I would die the death, yet wake up to life anew;
The sun would be all ablaze on the waste, and the sky a blighting blue,
And the tears would rise in my snow-blind eyes and furrow my cheeks like dew.
And the camps we made when their strength outplayed and the day was pinched and wan;
And oh, the joy of that blessed halt, and how I did dread the dawn;
And how I hated the weary men who rose and dragged me on.
And oh, how I begged to rest, to rest--the snow was so sweet a shroud;
And oh, how I cried when they urged me on, cried and cursed them aloud;
Yet on they strained, all racked and pained, and sorely their backs were bowed.
And then it was all like a lurid dream, and I prayed for a swift release
From the ruthless ones who would not leave me to die alone in peace;
Till I wakened up and I found myself at the post of the Mounted Police.
And there was my friend the murderer, and there was my friend the thief,
With bracelets of steel around their wrists, and wicked beyond belief:
But when they come to God's judgment seat--may I be allowed the brief.
Scheme | AAA BBB CCC DDD EXE BBB FFF GGG HXH III JJJ AAA |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 0101101000101101 011100101100101 01011101101101 1101001010100101 01011111111110111 01111101010101001 1110100110101101 1111011110110111 11011101111100111 1111101110111101 001011111011101 00111111110110101 1101001010101101 11010011110111001 1101111011111 1100111011100101 11111001110111101 0110110101110101 11001011111111 00111111110110101 01111010011111101 010111011111101 0111101101001011 00111011110101111 0011111110011101 010111110111101 011100101110111 0111111110111101 0111111111101101 111111010101101 011111010101110101 1010111111110101 11110111101101001 0111101000111101 1101101110100101 1111111011110101 |
Closest metre | Iambic octameter |
Characters | 2,493 |
Words | 502 |
Sentences | 13 |
Stanzas | 12 |
Stanza Lengths | 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3 |
Lines Amount | 36 |
Letters per line (avg) | 54 |
Words per line (avg) | 14 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 162 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 42 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 27, 2023
- 2:31 min read
- 99 Views
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"My Friends" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 7 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/32282/my-friends>.
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