Analysis of The Low-Down White
Robert William Service 1874 – 1958
This is the pay-day up at the mines, when the bearded brutes come down;
There's money to burn in the streets to-night, so I've sent my klooch to town,
With a haggard face and a ribband of red entwined in her hair of brown.
And I know at the dawn she'll come reeling home with the bottles, one, two, three --
One for herself, to drown her shame, and two big bottles for me,
To make me forget the thing I am and the man I used to be.
To make me forget the brand of the dog, as I crouch in this hideous place;
To make me forget once I kindled the light of love in a lady's face,
Where even the squalid Siwash now holds me a black disgrace.
Oh, I have guarded my secret well! And who would dream as I speak
In a tribal tongue like a rogue unhung, 'mid the ranch-house filth and reek,
I could roll to bed with a Latin phrase and rise with a verse of Greek?
Yet I was a senior prizeman once, and the pride of a college eight;
Called to the bar -- my friends were true! but they could not keep me straight;
Then came the divorce, and I went abroad and "died" on the River Plate.
But I'm not dead yet; though with half a lung there isn't time to spare,
And I hope that the year will see me out, and, thank God, no one will care --
Save maybe the little slim Siwash girl with the rose of shame in her hair.
She will come with the dawn, and the dawn is near; I can see its evil glow,
Like a corpse-light seen through a frosty pane in a night of want and woe;
And yonder she comes by the bleak bull-pines, swift staggering through the snow.
Scheme | AAA BBB CCC DDD EEE FFF GGG |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Triplet |
Metre | 1101111011010111 11011001111111111 10101001110100111 011101111011010111 110111010111011 1110101110011111 1110101101111011001 111011110011100101 11001011110101 1111011010111111 0010110111011101 11111101010110111 1110101100110101 110111011111111 11001011010110101 1111111101110111 01110111110111111 11001011110111001 111101001111111101 10111101010011101 01011101111100101 |
Characters | 1,517 |
Words | 314 |
Sentences | 10 |
Stanzas | 7 |
Stanza Lengths | 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3 |
Lines Amount | 21 |
Letters per line (avg) | 55 |
Words per line (avg) | 15 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 166 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 45 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:36 min read
- 107 Views
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"The Low-Down White" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 13 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/32582/the-low-down-white>.
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