Analysis of To My Laundress

Ambrose Bierce 1842 (Meigs County) – 1914 (Chihuahua)



Saponacea, wert thou not so fair
I'd curse thee for thy multitude of sins
For sending home my clothes all full of pins
A shirt occasionally that's a snare
And a delusion, got, the Lord knows where,
The Lord knows why-a sock whose outs and ins
None know, nor where it ends nor where begins,
And fewer cuffs than ought to be my share.
But when I mark thy lilies how they grow,
And the red roses of thy ripening charms,
I bless the lovelight in thy dark eyes dreaming.
I'll never pay thee, but I'd gladly go
Into the magic circle of thine arms,
Supple and fragrant from repeated steaming.


Scheme ABBAABBACDECDE
Poetic Form
Metre 111111 111111011 1101111111 0101000101 0001010111 0111011101 1111111101 0101111111 1111110111 00110111001 1101011110 1101111101 0101010111 10010101010
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 580
Words 113
Sentences 4
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 14
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 33
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 457
Words per stanza (avg) 111
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

35 sec read
53

Ambrose Bierce

Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist, and satirist. more…

All Ambrose Bierce poems | Ambrose Bierce Books

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