Analysis of A Social Call
Ambrose Bierce 1842 (Meigs County) – 1914 (Chihuahua)
Well, well, old Father Christmas, is it you,
With your thick neck and thin pretense of virtue?
Less redness in the nose-nay, even some blue
Would not, I think, particularly hurt you.
When seen close to, not mounted in your car,
You look the drunkard and the pig you are.
No matter, sit you down, for I am not
In a gray study, as you sometimes find me.
Merry? O, no, nor wish to be, God wot,
But there's another year of pain behind me.
That's something to be thankful for: the more
There are behind, the fewer are before.
I know you, Father Christmas, for a scamp,
But Heaven endowed me at my soul's creation
With an affinity to every tramp
That walks the world and steals its admiration.
For admiration is like linen left
Upon the line-got easiest by theft.
Good God! old man, just think of it! I've stood,
With brains and honesty, some five-and-twenty
Long years as champion of all that's good,
And taken on the mazzard thwacks a-plenty.
Yet now whose praises do the people bawl?
Those of the fellows whom I live to maul!
Why, this is odd!-the more I try to talk
Of you the more my tongue grows egotistic
To prattle of myself! I'll try to balk
Its waywardness and be more altruistic.
So let us speak of others-how they sin,
And what a devil of a state they 're in!
That's all I have to say. Good-bye, old man.
Next year you possibly may find me scolding
Or miss me altogether: Nature's plan
Includes, as I suppose, a final folding
Of these poor empty hands. Then dropp a tear
To think they'll never box another ear.
Scheme | AAAABB CDCDEE FGFGHH IDIDJJ KKKXLL MNMNXX |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111010111 11110101110 11000111011 1111100011 1111110011 1101000111 1101111111 00110110111 1011111111 11010111011 1101110101 1101010101 1111010101 110011111010 11010011001 1101011010 101011101 0101110011 1111111111 11010011010 1111001111 0101011010 1111010101 1101011111 1111011111 11011111 110111111 11011010 1111110111 01010101110 1111111111 11110011110 111010101 01110101010 1111011101 1111010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,489 |
Words | 288 |
Sentences | 23 |
Stanzas | 6 |
Stanza Lengths | 6, 6, 6, 6, 6, 6 |
Lines Amount | 36 |
Letters per line (avg) | 32 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 194 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 48 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:29 min read
- 84 Views
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"A Social Call" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/1662/a-social-call>.
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