Analysis of Wine and Water
Gilbert Keith Chesterton 1874 (Kensington, London) – 1936 (Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire)
Old Noah he had an ostrich farm and fowls on the largest scale,
He ate his egg with a ladle in a egg-cup big as a pail,
And the soup he took was Elephant Soup and fish he took was Whale,
But they all were small to the cellar he took when he set out to sail,
And Noah he often said to his wife when he sat down to dine,
"I don't care where the water goes if it doesn't get into the wine."
The cataract of the cliff of heaven fell blinding off the brink
As if it would wash the stars away as suds go down a sink,
The seven heavens came roaring down for the throats of hell to drink,
And Noah he cocked his eye and said, "It looks like rain, I think,
The water has drowned the Matterhorn as deep as a Mendip mine,
But I don't care where the water goes if it doesn't get into the wine."
But Noah he sinned, and we have sinned; on tipsy feet we trod,
Till a great big black teetotaller was sent to us for a rod,
And you can't get wine at a P.S.A., or chapel, or Eisteddfod,
For the Curse of Water has come again because of the wrath of God,
And water is on the Bishop's board and the Higher Thinker's shrine,
But I don't care where the water goes if it doesn't get into the wine.
Scheme | aaaabb ccccbB ddddbB |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1101111010110101 1111101000111101 0011111001011111 11101101011111111 0101101111111111 11110101111010101 0100101110110101 111110101111101 0101011011011111 010111101111111 0101101111011 111110101111010101 110110111110111 1011111111101 0111110111011 10111011010110111 010110101001011 111110101111010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic octameter |
Characters | 1,182 |
Words | 250 |
Sentences | 7 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 6, 6, 6 |
Lines Amount | 18 |
Letters per line (avg) | 50 |
Words per line (avg) | 14 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 297 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 81 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 30, 2023
- 1:17 min read
- 143 Views
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"Wine and Water" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/16039/wine-and-water>.
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