The Trucker Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABAB CDCD EFEF GHGH IJIJ KLML NNNN OPOP QRQR STST NNNN URUR VFVF| IF YOU want a game to tame you and to take your measure in | A |
| Try a week or two of trucking in a mine | B |
| Where the rails are never level for a half a minute s spin | A |
| And the curves are short and sharp along the line | B |
| - | |
| Try the feverish bottom level down five hundred feet of shaft | C |
| Where the atmosphere is like a second suit | D |
| When the wash is full of water and you ve got to run the graft | C |
| For there s forty ton of gravel in the shoot | D |
| - | |
| Want a job o truckin dost tha says the boss old Geordie Rist | E |
| Shift s a trucker short ma lad but aw don know | F |
| Can st tha do th work though think st tha Art a pretty decent fist | E |
| Eh well damme thoo can try it go below | F |
| - | |
| So the cage is manned the knocker clangs and clatters on the brace | G |
| The engine draws a deep defiant breath | H |
| To inflate her lungs of iron and in silence face to face | G |
| We drop into the darkness deep as death | H |
| - | |
| Then a fairy sense of lightness and of floating on the night | I |
| A sudden glare and Number Three is passed | J |
| Soon a sound of warring waters and another rush of light | I |
| All clear The up trip never seems so fast | J |
| - | |
| It is rough upon the tyro that first tussle with the trucks | K |
| The wretched four with worn three cornered wheels | L |
| That are sure to fall to his lot and to floor him if his pluck s | M |
| Not true when mates are grinding at his heels | L |
| - | |
| Then the struggle at the incline and the deuced ticklish squeeze | N |
| At the curves where strength alone not all avails | N |
| And the floundering in the mullock and the badly broken knees | N |
| Before he learns to run upon the rails | N |
| - | |
| But it s like all other grafting and the man that has the grit | O |
| Won t tucker out with one back racking shift | P |
| When he s sweated to condition with his muscles firm and fit | O |
| He ll disdain to stick at seven trucks of drift | P |
| - | |
| He can swarm around the pinches with a scramble and a dash | Q |
| And negotiate the inclines just as pat | R |
| And the sheets of iron rattle and the waters surge and splash | Q |
| As he shoots the 'full uns' in along the plat | R |
| - | |
| When the empties wind and clatter down the drive and through the dark | S |
| As blowing spells those backward journeys serve | T |
| On before deep set in darkness glints and glows a feeble spark | S |
| The candle burning dimly at the curve | T |
| - | |
| After cribs are polished off and when the smoke begins to rise | N |
| And cling about the caps and in the cracks | N |
| There s a passing satisfaction in the patriarchal lies | N |
| Of the Geordie pioneers and Cousin Jacks | N |
| - | |
| Lanky Steve s unwritten stories of the fun of Fifty two | U |
| Or the dashing days at Donkey Woman s Flat | R |
| Of traps and beaks and heavy yields and pugilists put through | U |
| And lifting up the flag at Ballarat | R |
| - | |
| Yes the truckers toil is rather heavy grafting as a rule | V |
| Much heavier than the wages well I know | F |
| But the life s not full of trouble and the fellow is a fool | V |
| Who cannot find some pleasure down below | F |
Edward George Dyson
(1)
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About The Trucker
The Trucker is a poem by Edward George Dyson. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.
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