Analysis of The Town Marshal
Edgar Lee Masters 1868 (Garnett) – 1950 (Elkins Park)
The Prohibitionists made me Town Marshal
When the saloons were voted out,
Because when I was a drinking man,
Before I joined the church, I killed a Swede
At the saw-mill near Maple Grove.
And they wanted a terrible man,
Grim, righteous, strong, courageous,
And a hater of saloons and drinkers,
To keep law and order in the village.
And they presented me with a loaded cane
With which I struck Jack McGuire
Before he drew the gun with which he killed me.
The Prohibitionists spent their money in vain
To hang him, for in a dream
I appeared to one of the twelve jurymen
And told him the whole secret story.
Fourteen years were enough for killing me.
Scheme | ABCDECFGHIJKILCKK |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 0111110 10010101 011110101 0111011101 10111101 011001001 1101010 0010101010 1110100010 01010110101 1111101 01110111111 01111001 1111001 101111011 011011010 1110011101 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 639 |
Words | 121 |
Sentences | 6 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 17 |
Lines Amount | 17 |
Letters per line (avg) | 30 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 513 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 119 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 36 sec read
- 55 Views
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"The Town Marshal" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 21 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/8725/the-town-marshal>.
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