Men And Women Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A ABCDEFEEGGDHEIEJKEEG LGGEMEEEI E NOPQEERSEGG TGUGVGEWEGEGWGEXEYZW WG EA2GGB2WGGDGEWE GGC2ED2E2F2E G2GD2EWE2N| IN THE BACKS | A |
| - | |
| As I was strolling lonely in the Backs | A |
| I met a woman whom I did not like | B |
| I did not like the way the woman walked | C |
| Loose hipped big boned disjointed angular | D |
| If her anatomy comprised a waist | E |
| I did not notice it she had a face | F |
| With eyes and lips adjusted thereunto | E |
| But round her mouth no pleasing shadows stirred | E |
| Nor did her eyes invite a second glance | G |
| Her dress was absolutely colourless | G |
| Devoid of taste or shape or character | D |
| Her boots were rather old and rather large | H |
| And rather shabby not precisely matched | E |
| Her hair was very far from beautiful | I |
| And not abundant she had such a hat | E |
| As neither merits nor expects remark | J |
| She was not clever I am very sure | K |
| Nor witty nor amusing well informed | E |
| She may have been and kind perhaps of heart | E |
| But gossip was writ plain upon her face | G |
| And so she stalked her dull unthinking way | L |
| Or if she thought of anything it was | G |
| That such a one had got a second class | G |
| Or Mrs So and So a second child | E |
| I did not want to see that girl again | M |
| I did not like her and I should not mind | E |
| If she were done away with killed or ploughed | E |
| She did not seem to serve a useful end | E |
| And certainly she was not beautiful | I |
| - | |
| - | |
| ON THE KING'S PARADE | E |
| - | |
| As I was waiting for the tardy tram | N |
| I met what purported to be a man | O |
| What seemed to pass for its material frame | P |
| The semblance of a suit of clothes had on | Q |
| Fit emblem of the grand sartorial art | E |
| And worthy of a more sublime abode | E |
| Its coat and waistcoat were of weird design | R |
| Adapted to the fashion's latest whim | S |
| I think it wore an Athen um tie | E |
| White flannels draped its too ethereal limbs | G |
| And in its vacant eye there glared a glass | G |
| - | |
| In vain for this poor derelict of flesh | T |
| Void of the spirit it was built to house | G |
| Have classic poets tuned their deathless lyre | U |
| Astute historians fingered mouldering sheets | G |
| And reared a palace of sententious truth | V |
| In vain has y been added unto x | G |
| In vain the mighty decimal unrolled | E |
| Which strives indefinitely to be g | W |
| In vain the palpitating frog has groaned | E |
| Beneath the licensed knife in vain for this | G |
| The surreptitious corpse been disinterred | E |
| And forced amid the disinfectant fumes | G |
| To yield its secrets to philosophy | W |
| In vain the stress and storm of politics | G |
| Beat round this empty head in vain the priest | E |
| Pronounces loud anathemas the fool | X |
| In vain remarks upon the fact that God | E |
| Is missing in the world of his belief | Y |
| Vain are the problems whether space or time | Z |
| Or force or matter can be said to be | W |
| Vain are the mysteries of Melchisedec | W |
| And vain Methuselah's unusual years | G |
| - | |
| It had a landlady I make no doubt | E |
| A friend or two as vacant as itself | A2 |
| A kitchen bill a thousand cigarettes | G |
| A dog which knew it for the fool it was | G |
| Perhaps it was a member of the Union | B2 |
| Who votes as often as he does not speak | W |
| And recommends as wildly as he spells | G |
| Its income was as much beyond its merits | G |
| As less than its inane expenditure | D |
| Its conversation stood to common sense | G |
| As stands the Sporting Times its favourite print | E |
| To wit or humour It was seldom drunk | W |
| But seldom sober when it went to bed | E |
| - | |
| The mean contents of these superior clothes | G |
| Were they but duly trained by careful hands | G |
| And castigated with remorseless zeal | C2 |
| Endowed with purpose gifted with a mind | E |
| And taught to work or play or talk or laugh | D2 |
| Might possibly aspire I do not know | E2 |
| To pass in time for what they dare to scorn | F2 |
| An ordinary undergraduate | E |
| - | |
| What did this thing crawling 'twixt heaven and earth | G2 |
| Amid the network of our grimy streets | G |
| What end was it intended to subserve | D2 |
| What lowly mission fashioned to neglect | E |
| It did not seem to wish for a degree | W |
| And what its object was I do not know | E2 |
| Unless it was to catch the tardy tram | N |
James Kenneth Stephen
(1)
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