Analysis of Mrs. Kessler
Edgar Lee Masters 1868 (Garnett) – 1950 (Elkins Park)
Mr Kessler, you know, was in the army,
And he drew six dollars a month as a pension,
And stood on the corner talking politics,
Or sat at home reading Grant's Memoirs;
And I supported the family by washing,
Learning the secrets of all the people
From their curtains, counterpanes, shirts and skirts.
For things that are new grow old at length,
They're replaced with better or none at all:
People are prospering or falling back.
And rents and patches widen with time;
No thread or needle can pace decay,
And there are stains that baffle soap,
And there are colors that run in spite of you,
Blamed though you are for spoiling a dress.
Handkerchieds, napery, have their secrets--
The laundress, Life, knows all about it.
And I, who went to all the funerals
Held in Spoon River, swear I never
Saw a dead face without thinking it looked
Like something washed and ironed.
Scheme | ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTU |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 10101110010 011110011010 0110101010 11111011 010100100110 1001011010 11101101 111111111 111101111 1011001101 010101011 111101101 01111101 01110110111 111111001 111110 01111011 0111110100 101101110 1011011011 1101010 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 872 |
Words | 157 |
Sentences | 6 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 21 |
Lines Amount | 21 |
Letters per line (avg) | 32 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 680 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 155 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 47 sec read
- 120 Views
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