Analysis of DEFACTO LIFE



.                         1.     10..
                 Life for me    Ernest Hemingway
    Is merely pretence,  Would listen to my plight,
           It never seems   And know how I’ve suffered
To make much sense.From merely being alive.
                           2:.11..
         Joy of living Kipling and Keats
    Is known by others,  Yes and Longfellow too,
   But somehow in life  Would all know of the pain
     I always suffer.  That life put me through.
                            3.   12.
I’m told that love  Hardy and Dante
    Can bring great joy,    And even Robert Blair,
       Yet to my women  Would think of my life
       I’m but a toy.  With such utter despair.
                           4.  13.
           They use me as  Thomas Moore, yes
 Other men use them,   And Alexander Pope,
  Paying me back  Would know I’ve lived life
    For their other men.   Without purpose or hope.
                           5.  14.
    Life must surely be  George Santayana
     A wondrous thing,  And even Walter Scott,
For the very few that  Knew of the good things
    Love doesn’t sting.  My life never got.
                          6. 15.
  Oscar Wilde would Robert Louie Stevenson
     Surely cry for me, And the great Mark Twain,
  For we poets know Would know that my life
      A common need. Has been one long, sad refrain.
                         7.16.
     Shakespeare tooSalvador Quasimodo
Would surely moan,And Upton Sinclair,
For all the pleasureHave tasted the success
    I’ve never known.That for me wasn’t there.
                           8.  17.
George Bernard Shaw    Milton and Priestly
Would sob with shame,  Would see with remorse,
             Muttering again   All the troubles I’ve met
     And again my name.  On my life’s sorry course.
                               9.   18.
Alfred Tennyson tooOrwell and Huxley
   Would moan my strife,And perhaps Tolstoy too,
       For, for me sufferingWould mourn for my life
          Is a way of life.Now that it is through.

THE END
                        © Copyright 2021, Philip Roberts
                             Melbourne, Victoria, Australia


Scheme ABXXXAXCDCABEFEAGHFHAIJXJAXDFDAXEGEAKLXLAKCFC XXI
Poetic Form
Metre 1 1111010 1101110111 1101011110 1111101001 1 11101001 1111010101 1101111101 111011111 1 111110010 1111010101 1111011111 1101111001 1 11111011 1011100101 101111111 11101011011 1 111011010 0101010101 10101111011 11111101 1 10111001100 1011100111 1110111111 01011111101 1 110010 11011001 110110001 11011111 1 101110010 111111101 10001101011 00111111101 1 101001010 11110111 11111111 101111111 01 101010 100100010
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 2,136
Words 299
Sentences 37
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 45, 3
Lines Amount 48
Letters per line (avg) 26
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 629
Words per stanza (avg) 180

About this poem

One of my more moody existential poems from the 1980s.

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Written on 1981

Submitted by PHIL_ROBERTS on August 25, 2021

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:29 min read
1

Phil Roberts

I turn 65 on the 31st of January 2022. I love cats, rock music, and horror fiction and poetry more…

All Phil Roberts poems | Phil Roberts Books

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