Portrait Of The Artist As A Prematurely Old Man Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBCDEEFGHIGJJCKLCI IIMMNBICCBEBOPP| It is common knowledge to every schoolboy and even every Bachelor of Arts | A |
| That all sin is divided into two parts | A |
| One kind of sin is called a sin of commission and that is very important | B |
| And it is what you are doing when you are doing something you ortant | B |
| And the other kind of sin is just the opposite and is called a sin of omission | C |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp and is equally bad in the eyes of all right thinking people from | D |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp Billy Sunday to Buddha | E |
| And it consists of not having done something you shuddha | E |
| I might as well give you my opinion of these two kinds of sin as long as | F |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp in a way against each other we are pitting them | G |
| And that is don't bother your head about the sins of commission because | H |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp however sinful they must at least be fun or else you wouldn't be | I |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp committing them | G |
| It is the sin of omission the second kind of sin | J |
| That lays eggs under your skin | J |
| The way you really get painfully bitten | C |
| Is by the insurance you haven't taken out and the checks you haven't added up | K |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp the stubs of and the appointments you haven't kept and the bills you | L |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp haven't paid and the letters you haven't written | C |
| Also about sins of omission there is one particularly painful lack of beauty | I |
| Namely it isn't as though it had been a riotous red letter day or night every | I |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp time you neglected to do your duty | I |
| You didn't get a wicked forbidden thrill | M |
| Every time you let a policy lapse or forget to pay a bill | M |
| You didn't slap the lads in the tavern on the back and loudly cry Whee | N |
| Let's all fail to write just one more letter before we go home and this round | B |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp of unwritten letters is on me | I |
| No you never get any fun | C |
| Out of things you haven't done | C |
| But they are the things that I do not like to be amid | B |
| Because the suitable things you didn't do give you a lot more trouble than the | E |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp unsuitable things you did | B |
| The moral is that it is probably better not to sin at all but if some kind of | O |
| nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp sin you must be pursuing | P |
| Well remember to do it by doing rather than by not doing | P |
Ogden Nash
(1)
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