Paul's Wife Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGAHIJKCLMNOPQE RSTGUGVWXMGYZMA2SGXY I B2C2D2WE2FF2G2H2XI2J 2CK2L2XEM2N2O2XXP2Q2 XGXR2XS2R2T2U2U2V2W2 X2X2CY2MO2Z2A3SYXXK2 B3C3O2XD3A3M2K2E3X2X F3A2ZG3H3I3J3JMXAAK3 AL3CM3N3MZO3 P3Q3YO2X2R3GS3X2T3CJ 3V2X2U3X2M2A2X2N2X2M X2CMV3CM2M2T3M2M2MCXto say to him | A |
'How is the wife Paul ' and he'd disappear | B |
Some said it was because be bad no wife | C |
And hated to be twitted on the subject | D |
Others because he'd come within a day | E |
Or so of having one and then been Jilted | F |
Others because he'd had one once a good one | G |
Who'd run away with someone else and left him | A |
And others still because he had one now | H |
He only had to be reminded of | I |
He was all duty to her in a minute | J |
He had to run right off to look her up | K |
As if to say 'That's so how is my wife | C |
I hope she isn't getting into mischief ' | L |
No one was anxious to get rid of Paul | M |
He'd been the hero of the mountain camps | N |
Ever since just to show them he bad slipped | O |
The bark of a whole tamarack off whole | P |
As clean as boys do off a willow twig | Q |
To make a willow whistle on a Sunday | E |
April by subsiding meadow brooks | R |
They seemed to ask him just to see him go | S |
'How is the wife Paul ' and he always went | T |
He never stopped to murder anyone | G |
Who asked the question He just disappeared | U |
Nobody knew in what direction | G |
Although it wasn't usually long | V |
Before they beard of him in some new camp | W |
The same Paul at the same old feats of logging | X |
The question everywhere was why should Paul | M |
Object to being asked a civil question | G |
A man you could say almost anything to | Y |
Short of a fighting word You have the answers | Z |
And there was one more not so fair to Paul | M |
That Paul had married a wife not his equal | A2 |
Paul was ashamed of her To match a hero | S |
She would have had to be a heroine | G |
Instead of which she was some half breed squaw | X |
But if the story Murphy told was true | Y |
She wasn't anything to be ashamed of | I |
- | |
You know Paul could do wonders Everyone's | B2 |
Heard how he thrashed the horses on a load | C2 |
That wouldn't budge until they simply stretched | D2 |
Their rawhide harness from the load to camp | W |
Paul told the boss the load would be all right | E2 |
'The sun will bring your load in' and it did | F |
By shrinking the rawhide to natural length | F2 |
That's what is called a stretcher But I guess | G2 |
The one about his jumping so's to land | H2 |
With both his feet at once against the ceiling | X |
And then land safely right side up again | I2 |
Back on the floor is fact or pretty near fact | J2 |
Well this is such a yarn Paul sawed his wife | C |
Out of a white pine log Murphy was there | K2 |
And as you might say saw the lady born | L2 |
Paul worked at anything in lumbering | X |
He'd been bard at it taking boards away | E |
For I forget the last ambitious sawyer | M2 |
To want to find out if he couldn't pile | N2 |
The lumber on Paul till Paul begged for mercy | O2 |
They'd sliced the first slab off a big butt log | X |
And the sawyer had slammed the carriage back | X |
To slam end on again against the saw teeth | P2 |
To judge them by the way they caught themselves | Q2 |
When they saw what had happened to the log | X |
They must have had a guilty expectation | G |
Something was going to go with their slambanging | X |
Something bad left a broad black streak of grease | R2 |
On the new wood the whole length of the log | X |
Except perhaps a foot at either end | S2 |
But when Paul put his finger in the grease | R2 |
It wasn't grease at all but a long slot | T2 |
The log was hollow They were sawing pine | U2 |
'First time I ever saw a hollow pine | U2 |
That comes of having Paul around the place | V2 |
Take it to bell for me ' the sawyer said | W2 |
Everyone had to have a look at it | X2 |
And tell Paul what he ought to do about it | X2 |
They treated it as his 'You take a jackknife | C |
And spread the opening and you've got a dugout | Y2 |
All dug to go a fishing in ' To Paul | M |
The hollow looked too sound and clean and empty | O2 |
Ever to have housed birds or beasts or bees | Z2 |
There was no entrance for them to get in by | A3 |
It looked to him like some new kind of hollow | S |
He thought he'd better take his jackknife to | Y |
So after work that evening be came back | X |
And let enough light into it by cutting | X |
To see if it was empty He made out in there | K2 |
A slender length of pith or was it pith | B3 |
It might have been the skin a snake had cast | C3 |
And left stood up on end inside the tree | O2 |
The hundred years the tree must have been growing | X |
More cutting and he bad this in both hands | D3 |
And looking from it to the pond nearby | A3 |
Paul wondered how it would respond to water | M2 |
Not a breeze stirred but just the breath of air | K2 |
He made in walking slowly to the beach | E3 |
Blew it once off his hands and almost broke it | X2 |
He laid it at the edge where it could drink | X |
At the first drink it rustled and grew limp | F3 |
At the next drink it grew invisible | A2 |
Paul dragged the shallows for it with his fingers | Z |
And thought it must have melted It was gone | G3 |
And then beyond the open water dim with midges | H3 |
Where the log drive lay pressed against the boom | I3 |
It slowly rose a person rose a girl | J3 |
Her wet hair heavy on her like a helmet | J |
Who leaning on a log looked back at Paul | M |
And that made Paul in turn look back | X |
To see if it was anyone behind him | A |
That she was looking at instead of him | A |
Murphy had been there watching all the time | K3 |
But from a shed where neither of them could see him | A |
There was a moment of suspense in birth | L3 |
When the girl seemed too waterlogged to live | C |
Before she caught her first breath with a gasp | M3 |
And laughed Then she climbed slowly to her feet | N3 |
And walked off talking to herself or Paul | M |
Across the logs like backs of alligators | Z |
Paul taking after her around the pond | O3 |
- | |
Next evening Murphy and some other fellows | P3 |
Got drunk and tracked the pair up Catamount | Q3 |
From the bare top of which there is a view | Y |
TO other hills across a kettle valley | O2 |
And there well after dark let Murphy tell it | X2 |
They saw Paul and his creature keeping house | R3 |
It was the only glimpse that anyone | G |
Has had of Paul and her since Murphy saw them | S3 |
Falling in love across the twilight millpond | X2 |
More than a mile across the wilderness | T3 |
They sat together halfway up a cliff | C |
In a small niche let into it the girl | J3 |
Brightly as if a star played on the place | V2 |
Paul darkly like her shadow All the light | X2 |
Was from the girl herself though not from a star | U3 |
As was apparent from what happened next | X2 |
All those great ruffians put their throats together | M2 |
And let out a loud yell and threw a bottle | A2 |
As a brute tribute of respect to beauty | X2 |
Of course the bottle fell short by a mile | N2 |
But the shout reached the girl and put her light out | X2 |
She went out like a firefly and that was all | M |
- | |
So there were witnesses that Paul was married | X2 |
And not to anyone to be ashamed of | C |
Everyone had been wrong in judging Paul | M |
Murphy told me Paul put on all those airs | V3 |
About his wife to keep her to himself | C |
Paul was what's called a terrible possessor | M2 |
Owning a wife with him meant owning her | M2 |
She wasn't anybody else's business | T3 |
Either to praise her or much as name her | M2 |
And he'd thank people not to think of her | M2 |
Murphy's idea was that a man like Paul | M |
Wouldn't be spoken to about a wife | C |
In any way the world knew how to speak | X |
Robert Frost
(1)
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