On Looking Through an old Punishment Book [At Eurunderee School]

Henry Lawson 1867 (Grenfell) – 1922 (Sydney)



I took the book of punishment,
And ran its columns down;
I started with an open brow
And ended with a frown;
I noted long-forgotten names
They took me unaware;
I noted old familiar names.
But my names wasn’t there!

I thought of what I might have been,
And Oh! My heart was pained
To find, of all the scholars there,
That I was never caned!
I thought of wasted childhood hours,
And a tear rolled down my cheek
I must have been a model boy,
Which means a little sneak!

“Oh, give me back my youth again!”
Doc Faustus used to say –
I only wish the Powers could give
My boyhood for a day,
A model boy! Beloved of girls!
Despised by boys and men!
But it comforts me to think that I’ve
Made up for it since then.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

43 sec read
80

Quick analysis:

Scheme XAXABCBC XDCDXEXE FGHGXFHF
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 708
Words 146
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8

Henry Lawson

Henry Lawson 17 June 1867 - 2 September 1922 was an Australian writer and poet Along with his contemporary Banjo Paterson Lawson is among the best-known Australian poets and fiction writers of the colonial period more…

All Henry Lawson poems | Henry Lawson Books

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