Analysis of Afternoon Tea
Robert William Service 1874 – 1958
As I was saying . . . (No, thank you; I never take cream with my tea;
Cows weren't allowed in the trenches -- got out of the habit, y'see.)
As I was saying, our Colonel leaped up like a youngster of ten:
"Come on, lads!" he shouts, "and we'll show 'em," and he sprang to the head of the men.
Then some bally thing seemed to trip him, and he fell on his face with a slam. . . .
Oh, he died like a true British soldier, and the last word he uttered was "Damn!"
And hang it! I loved the old fellow, and something just burst in my brain,
And I cared no more for the bullets than I would for a shower of rain.
'Twas an awf'ly funny sensation (I say, this is jolly nice tea);
I felt as if something had broken; by gad! I was suddenly free.
Free for a glorified moment, beyond regulations and laws,
Free just to wallow in slaughter, as the chap of the Stone Age was.
So on I went joyously nursing a Berserker rage of my own,
And though all my chaps were behind me, feeling most frightf'ly alone;
With the bullets and shells ding-donging, and the "krock" and the swish of the shrap;
And I found myself humming "Ben Bolt" . . . (Will you pass me the sugar, old chap?
Two lumps, please). . . . What was I saying? Oh yes, the jolly old dash;
We simply ripped through the barrage, and on with a roar and a crash.
My fellows -- Old Nick couldn't stop 'em. On, on they went with a yell,
Till they tripped on the Boches' sand-bags, -- nothing much left to tell:
A trench so tattered and battered that even a rat couldn't live;
Some corpses tangled and mangled, wire you could pass through a sieve.
The jolly old guns had bilked us, cheated us out of our show,
And my fellows were simply yearning for a red mix-up with the foe.
So I shouted to them to follow, and on we went roaring again,
Battle-tuned and exultant, on in the leaden rain.
Then all at once a machine gun barks from a bit of a bank,
And our Major roars in a fury: "We've got to take it on flank."
He was running like fire to lead us, when down like a stone he comes,
As full of "typewriter" bullets as a pudding is full of plums.
So I took his job and we got 'em. . . . By gad! we got 'em like rats;
Down in a deep shell-crater we fought like Kilkenny cats.
'Twas pleasant just for a moment to be sheltered and out of range,
With someone you saw to go for -- it made an agreeable change.
And the Boches that missed my bullets, my chaps gave a bayonet jolt,
And all the time, I remember, I whistled and hummed "Ben Bolt".
Well, that little job was over, so hell for leather we ran,
On to the second line trenches, -- that's where the fun began.
For though we had strafed 'em like fury, there still were some Boches about,
And my fellows, teeth set and eyes glaring, like terriers routed 'em out.
Then I stumbled on one of their dug-outs, and I shouted: "Is anyone there?"
And a voice, "Yes, one; but I'm wounded," came faint up the narrow stair;
And my man was descending before me, when sudden a cry! a shot!
(I say, this cake is delicious. You make it yourself, do you not?)
My man? Oh, they killed the poor devil; for if there was one there was ten;
So after I'd bombed 'em sufficient I went down at the head of my men,
And four tried to sneak from a bunk-hole, but we cornered the rotters all right;
I'd rather not go into details, 'twas messy that bit of the fight.
But all of it's beastly messy; let's talk of pleasanter things:
The skirts that the girls are wearing, ridiculous fluffy things,
So short that they show. . . . Oh, hang it! Well, if I must, I must.
We cleaned out the second trench line, bomb and bayonet thrust;
And on we went to the third one, quite calloused to crumping by now;
And some of our fellows who'd passed us were making a deuce of a row;
And my chaps -- well, I just couldn't hold 'em; (It's strange how it is with gore;
In some ways it's just like whiskey: if you taste it you must have more.)
Their eyes were like beacons of battle; by gad, sir! they COULDN'T be calmed,
So I headed 'em bang for the bomb-belt, racing like billy-be-damned.
Oh, it didn't take long to arrive there, those who arrived at all;
The machine guns were certainly chronic, the shindy enough to appal.
Oh yes, I omitted to tell you, I'd wounds on the chest and the head,
And my shirt was torn to a gun-rag, and my face blood-gummy and red.
I'm thinking I looked like a madman; I fancy I felt one too,
Half naked and swinging a rifle. . . . God! what a glorious "do".
As I sit here in old Piccadilly, sipping my afternoon tea,
I see a blind, bullet-chipped devil, and it's hard
Scheme | AABBCCDDAAXX EEFFGGHHXX IIBDJJKKLLMM NNOOPPQQRRBBSS TTUUXIVVXXXHWW XXAX |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111011111011111 11001001011101011 11110101011101011 111110111011101101 111011111011111101 1111011010001111011 01111011001011011 011111010111101011 1111001011111011 11111011011111001 11010100101001 1111001010110111 1111110011111 011110011101101 10100111001001101 01111011111101011 111111101101011 1101100101101001 1101110111111101 111101011101111 0111001011001101 1101001010111101 0101111110111101 01100101010111101 11101111001111001 1010010100101 111100111101101 01010100101111111 11101101111110111 111101010101111 1111101111111111 100111011111 1101101011100111 111111111101001 0010111101110101 010110101100111 111011101111011 11010110110101 11111111011011001 011011011011001011 111011111101101101 0011111101110101 01110100111100101 1111101011101111 11111011011111111 110111010111101111 01111101111100111 11011010111011101 111111011111 011011100100101 11111111111111 1110101110101 011110111101111 011101011101001101 01111110111111111 0111111011111111 11011011011111011 11101110111011011 1110111011110111 0011010010010111 11101011111101001 01111101101111001 110111011101111 1100100101101001 111101100101011 110110110011 |
Closest metre | Iambic octameter |
Characters | 4,470 |
Words | 884 |
Sentences | 67 |
Stanzas | 6 |
Stanza Lengths | 12, 10, 12, 14, 14, 4 |
Lines Amount | 66 |
Letters per line (avg) | 51 |
Words per line (avg) | 14 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 562 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 149 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 17, 2023
- 4:30 min read
- 88 Views
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"Afternoon Tea" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 30 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/31971/afternoon-tea>.
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