Analysis of Sensitive Burglar



Selecting in the dining-room
          The silver of his choice,
The burglar heard from chamber gloom
          A female voice.
As cold and bitter as a toad,
          She spat a nasty name,
So even as his swag he stowed
          He blushed for shame.

'You dirty dog!' he heard her say,
          'I sniff your whisky stench.
I bet you've gambled half your pay,
          Or blown it on a wench.
Begone from here, you rakehell boor!
          You shame the human race.
What wife would pillow-share with your
          Disgusting face!'

A tear the tender burglar shed,
          Then indignation rose,
And swiftly striding to her bed
          He said: 'I'm none of those.
I am a connoisseur in crime
          And felonies I plan . . .
But otherwise, believe me I'm
          A GENTLEMAN.'


Scheme ABABCDCD EFEFXGXG HIHIJXJX
Poetic Form
Metre 01000101 010111 01011101 011 11010101 110101 11011111 1111 11011101 111101 11110111 111101 111111 110101 11110111 0101 01010101 10101 01010101 111111 1100101 010011 1100111 0100
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 775
Words 128
Sentences 14
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8
Lines Amount 24
Letters per line (avg) 21
Words per line (avg) 5
Letters per stanza (avg) 170
Words per stanza (avg) 42
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

38 sec read
41

Robert William Service

Robert William Service was a poet and writer sometimes referred to as the Bard of the Yukon He is best-known for his writings on the Canadian North including the poems The Shooting of Dan McGrew The Law of the Yukon and The Cremation of Sam McGee His writing was so expressive that his readers took him for a hard-bitten old Klondike prospector not the later-arriving bank clerk he actually was Robert William Service was born 16 January 1874 in Preston England but also lived in Scotland before emigrating to Canada in 1894 Service went to the Yukon Territory in 1904 as a bank clerk and became famous for his poems about this region which are mostly in his first two books of poetry He wrote quite a bit of prose as well and worked as a reporter for some time but those writings are not nearly as well known as his poems He travelled around the world quite a bit and narrowly escaped from France at the beginning of the Second World War during which time he lived in Hollywood California He died 11 September 1958 in France Incidentally he played himself in a movie called The Spoilers starring John Wayne and Marlene Dietrich more…

All Robert William Service poems | Robert William Service Books

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