Analysis of Mango

Neil McLeod 1947 (Oxford)



I know where the mangos grow
Down beside the sea,
Heavy, ripe and sticky skinned,
Hanging on a tree;
Shading out the coastline
Down Mombasa way,
Every time I taste one
In my mind I say...

“Oh yes this is mango,
The fragrance and the taste,
Nothing I have ever known
Can ever take it's place.”
I hear again the ocean,
The ceaseless rushing roar,
Clear and vivid images
Of that eastern shore.

They say it was the Portuguese
Who brought them to the land,
So they'd have this delicious fruit
At outposts they command.
And further down the trade routes
A sorry tale to tell
The mangos show where slavers went
Because they grew so well.

I know where the mangos grow
Down beside the sea,
Heavy, ripe and sticky skinned,
Hanging on a tree.
You have to suck a mango,
You really shouldn't bite it,
Or you'll get strings between you teeth
And you will not like it!

This poem is published in "One for the Pot" on Amazon.com


Scheme ABCBxded axxxefxf xgxgxhxh ABCBaixi x
Poetic Form
Metre 111011 10101 1010101 10101 10101 10101 1001111 01111 111110 010001 1011101 110111 1101010 010101 1010100 11101 1111010 111101 11110101 11101 0101011 010111 011111 011111 111011 10101 1010101 10101 1111010 1101011 11110111 011111 1101100110111
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 888
Words 174
Sentences 9
Stanzas 5
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8, 8, 1
Lines Amount 33
Letters per line (avg) 21
Words per line (avg) 5
Letters per stanza (avg) 142
Words per stanza (avg) 34
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Submitted by NeilMcLeod on October 09, 2013

Modified on April 04, 2023

53 sec read
13

Neil McLeod

Born in Oxford, raised in Kenya, past winner of Los Slamgeles Poetry Slam and author of abitingchance.blogspot.comand "The First Thanksgiving".Doctor McLeod is a performing poet who has recited at Highland Games, dinners and Burns Nights for the last 36 years. He is happily married, lives and works in Los Angeles,has three children, and practices as a dentist on Sunset Boulevard:http://www.drneilmcleod.com/He can be contacted by e-mail at drneilmcleod@yahoo.com and will willingly entertain requests to share his work with permission. more…

All Neil McLeod poems | Neil McLeod Books

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