Mickey M’Grew
It was just like everything else in life:Something outside myself drew me down,My own strength never failed me.Why, there was the time I earned the moneyWith which to go away to school,And my father suddenly needed helpAnd I had to give him all of it.Just so it went till I ended upA man-of-all-work in Spoon River.Thus when I got the water-tower cleaned,And they hauled me up the seventy feet,I unhooked the rope from my waist,And laughingly flung my giant armsOver the smooth steel lips of the top of the tower—But they slipped from the treacherous slime,And down, down, down, I plungedThrough bellowing darkness!
Words in this poem
- went n.
- Course; way; path; journey; direction.
- laughingly adv.
- With laughter or merriment.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Mickey M’Grew is in the public domain. This text is taken from Spoon River Anthology, Project Gutenberg ebook #1280; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Edgar Lee Masters, Mickey M’Grew, in Spoon River Anthology (1915), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1280, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/masters-spoon-river/mickey-m-grew.html, id L07858.
Form and metre
Mickey M’Grew is 17 lines in a single verse paragraph. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 75%). 86% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.9 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 29% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic pentameter, other poems in blank verse.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| It was just like everything else in life: | 10 | ····/˘···· |
| Something outside myself drew me down, | 9 | /˘//·/··· |
| My own strength never failed me. | 7 | ···/˘·· |
| Why, there was the time I earned the money | 10 | ········/˘ |
| With which to go away to school, | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| And my father suddenly needed help | 10 | ··/˘/˘˘/˘· |
| And I had to give him all of it. | 9 | ········· |
| Just so it went till I ended up | 9 | ······/˘· |
| A man-of-all-work in Spoon River. | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| Thus when I got the water-tower cleaned, | 10 | ·····/˘/˘· |
| And they hauled me up the seventy feet, | 10 | ······/˘˘· |
| I unhooked the rope from my waist, | 8 | ·˘/····· |
| And laughingly flung my giant arms | 9 | ·/˘˘··/˘· |
| Over the smooth steel lips of the top of the tower— | 13 | ···········/˘ |
| But they slipped from the treacherous slime, | 9 | ·····/˘˘· |
| And down, down, down, I plunged | 6 | ······ |
| Through bellowing darkness! | 6 | ·/˘˘/˘ |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.