Analysis of Grin



If you're up against a bruiser and you're getting knocked about --

If you're feeling pretty groggy, and you're licked beyond a doubt --

Don't let him see you're funking, let him know with every clout,
Though your face is battered to a pulp, your blooming heart is stout;
Just stand upon your pins until the beggar knocks you out --

This life's a bally battle, and the same advice holds true

If you're up against it badly, then it's only one on you,

If the future's black as thunder, don't let people see you're blue;
Just cultivate a cast-iron smile of joy the whole day through;
If they call you "Little Sunshine", wish that THEY'D no troubles, too --

You may -- grin.

Rise up in the morning with the will that, smooth or rough,

Sink to sleep at midnight, and although you're feeling tough,

There's nothing gained by whining, and you're not that kind of stuff;
You're a fighter from away back, and you WON'T take a rebuff;
Your trouble is that you don't know when you have had enough --

Don't give in.

If Fate should down you, just get up and take another cuff;
You may bank on it that there is no philosophy like bluff,


Scheme A A AAA B B BBB C D D DDD C DD
Poetic Form
Metre 11101010110101 111010100110101 11111111111001 111110101110111 11011101010111 11010100010111 111011101110111 101011101110111 11001101110111 11111011111101 111 1100101011111 11111011101 11011100111111 101010110111001 11011111111101 110 11111111010101 111111111010011
Closest metre Iambic heptameter
Characters 1,176
Words 226
Sentences 11
Stanzas 12
Stanza Lengths 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 2
Lines Amount 19
Letters per line (avg) 45
Words per line (avg) 11
Letters per stanza (avg) 71
Words per stanza (avg) 18
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on May 02, 2023

1:14 min read
1,518

Robert William Service

Robert William Service was a poet and writer sometimes referred to as the Bard of the Yukon He is best-known for his writings on the Canadian North including the poems The Shooting of Dan McGrew The Law of the Yukon and The Cremation of Sam McGee His writing was so expressive that his readers took him for a hard-bitten old Klondike prospector not the later-arriving bank clerk he actually was Robert William Service was born 16 January 1874 in Preston England but also lived in Scotland before emigrating to Canada in 1894 Service went to the Yukon Territory in 1904 as a bank clerk and became famous for his poems about this region which are mostly in his first two books of poetry He wrote quite a bit of prose as well and worked as a reporter for some time but those writings are not nearly as well known as his poems He travelled around the world quite a bit and narrowly escaped from France at the beginning of the Second World War during which time he lived in Hollywood California He died 11 September 1958 in France Incidentally he played himself in a movie called The Spoilers starring John Wayne and Marlene Dietrich more…

All Robert William Service poems | Robert William Service Books

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