In The Waiting Room Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFEBGHIJKLBMNODD POOBKOQODOQRSDTIUOVW OPXBOBYBZQDLB OA2SB2C2OD2E2F2RG2OO DOOOODQP ZPOOH2LODPBBI2I2J2C K2QL2D M2IOA2N2B| In Worcester Massachusetts | A |
| I went with Aunt Consuelo | B |
| to keep her dentist's appointment | C |
| and sat and waited for her | D |
| in the dentist's waiting room | E |
| It was winter It got dark | F |
| early The waiting room | E |
| was full of grown up people | B |
| arctics and overcoats | G |
| lamps and magazines | H |
| My aunt was inside | I |
| what seemed like a long time | J |
| and while I waited and read | K |
| the National Geographic | L |
| I could read and carefully | B |
| studied the photographs | M |
| the inside of a volcano | N |
| black and full of ashes | O |
| then it was spilling over | D |
| in rivulets of fire | D |
| Osa and Martin Johnson | P |
| dressed in riding breeches | O |
| laced boots and pith helmets | O |
| A dead man slung on a pole | B |
| Long Pig the caption said | K |
| Babies with pointed heads | O |
| wound round and round with string | Q |
| black naked women with necks | O |
| wound round and round with wire | D |
| like the necks of light bulbs | O |
| Their breasts were horrifying | Q |
| I read it right straight through | R |
| I was too shy to stop | S |
| And then I looked at the cover | D |
| the yellow margins the date | T |
| Suddenly from inside | I |
| came an oh of pain | U |
| Aunt Consuelo's voice | O |
| not very loud or long | V |
| I wasn't at all surprised | W |
| even then I knew she was | O |
| a foolish timid woman | P |
| I might have been embarrassed | X |
| but wasn't What took me | B |
| completely by surprise | O |
| was that it was me | B |
| my voice in my mouth | Y |
| Without thinking at all | B |
| I was my foolish aunt | Z |
| I we were falling falling | Q |
| our eyes glued to the cover | D |
| of the National Geographic | L |
| February | B |
| - | |
| I said to myself three days | O |
| and you'll be seven years old | A2 |
| I was saying it to stop | S |
| the sensation of falling off | B2 |
| the round turning world | C2 |
| into cold blue black space | O |
| But I felt you are an I | D2 |
| you are an Elizabeth | E2 |
| you are one of them | F2 |
| Why should you be one too | R |
| I scarcely dared to look | G2 |
| to see what it was I was | O |
| I gave a sidelong glance | O |
| I couldn't look any higher | D |
| at shadowy gray knees | O |
| trousers and skirts and boots | O |
| and different pairs of hands | O |
| lying under the lamps | O |
| I knew that nothing stranger | D |
| had ever happened that nothing | Q |
| stranger could ever happen | P |
| - | |
| Why should I be my aunt | Z |
| or me or anyone | P |
| What similarities | O |
| boots hands the family voice | O |
| I felt in my throat or even | H2 |
| the National Geographic | L |
| and those awful hanging breasts | O |
| held us all together | D |
| or made us all just one | P |
| How I didn't know any | B |
| word for it how unlikely | B |
| How had I come to be here | I2 |
| like them and overhear | I2 |
| a cry of pain that could have | J2 |
| got loud and worse but hadn't | C |
| - | |
| The waiting room was bright | K2 |
| and too hot It was sliding | Q |
| beneath a big black wave | L2 |
| another and another | D |
| - | |
| Then I was back in it | M2 |
| The War was on Outside | I |
| in Worcester Massachusetts | O |
| were night and slush and cold | A2 |
| and it was still the fifth | N2 |
| of February | B |
Elizabeth Bishop
(2)
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About In The Waiting Room
In The Waiting Room is a poem by Elizabeth Bishop. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.
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