Analysis of The Friends of Fallen Fortunes
Henry Lawson 1867 (Grenfell) – 1922 (Sydney)
The battlefield behind us,
And night loomed on the track;
The Friends of Fallen Fortunes
Were riding at my back.
Save those who lay face upward
Upon the sodden plain,
Not one of all I’d trusted
Was missing from my train.
A draggled train and blood-stained,
With helmets dented in,
With battered, loosened armour,
But with a cheerful grin.
No dark look bent upon me;
I noted to my shame
That Friends of Fallen Fortunes
Are aye the last to blame.
Not one of all I’d trusted,
Who’d followed to their cost,
Save those who lay face upward
On that red field I’d lost;
And here and there a soldier
I’d trusted not at all,
Like an unexpected mourner
At a poor man’s funeral.
And as the horses stumbled,
And the footmen limped along,
They all joined in the chorus
Of a good old Next Time song.
Behind us in the distance,
By hill and lane and wood,
My ever-dwindling rear-guard
Fell back again and stood.
They recked not wounds nor losses,
They all seemed very kind,
From knight who rode beside me
To boor who limped behind;
And some borne in their litters
Through that long agony—
Their death-white, pain-drawn faces
Had no reproach for me.
And so from noon till darkness,
Till morning grim and grey,
The Earl’s son and the Peasant’s
Were brothers that dark day.
I straightened in my saddle,
And proudly glanced me round—
I still was King of Comrades,
Whoever might be crowned!
I straightened in my saddle,
And glanced round proudly then—
Whoe’er might reign a season,
I held the hearts of men!
No power of gold can buy them
While battles shall be fought—
The Friends of Fallen Fortunes
Are never to be bought.
Through rain and marsh and hunger,
To what their fate might bring,
The remnants of my legions
Toiled on to join their King.
From north and south the captains
Of scattered bands won through—
Beneath its beaten colours
My beaten army grew.
And in the West before us—
The West was ever thus—
More Friends of Fallen Fortunes
Were gathering food for us;
For refuge and for succour—
For safety, food and rest—
The best of beaten armies
For ever seek the West.
With these men for my captains,
When we marched east again,
Our enemies were scattered
Like dust across the plain.
Our city lay before us,
And as we marched along,
We joined the grand old chorus
Of the glorious Next Time song.
And though they wear no armour,
And bear no blade nor bill,
The Friends of Fallen Fortunes
Are riding with me still;
And, many times defeated
By city, field, and sea,
The Friends of Fallen Fortunes
March on to Victory.
Scheme | abCbDeFe xghgijcj FxDxhxhk xlalxmxm noioxini apxpKqxq KrxrxxCx hscsctat aacahuxu crdealalhvCvxiCi |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 010011 011101 0111010 010111 1111110 010101 1111110 110111 011011 110100 1101010 110101 1111011 110111 1111010 110111 1111110 110111 1111110 111111 0101010 110111 1101010 1011100 0101010 001101 1110010 1011111 0110010 110101 11010011 110101 1111110 111101 1111011 111101 0110110 111100 1111110 110111 0111110 110101 0110010 010111 1100110 010111 111111 010111 1100110 011101 111010 110111 11011111 110111 0111010 110111 1101010 111111 0101110 111111 1101010 110111 011101 110101 0001011 011101 1111010 0100111 110011 110101 0111010 110101 1111110 111101 10100010 110101 10101011 011101 1101110 10100111 0111110 011111 0111010 110111 0101010 110101 0111010 111100 |
Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
Characters | 2,468 |
Words | 459 |
Sentences | 19 |
Stanzas | 10 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 16 |
Lines Amount | 88 |
Letters per line (avg) | 22 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 196 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 46 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 12, 2023
- 2:17 min read
- 131 Views
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"The Friends of Fallen Fortunes" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/18000/the-friends-of--fallen-fortunes>.
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