Analysis of The Thing That's Missing
Robert Joseph Mattingly 1957 (Brookline, Massachusetts)
Our garbage man's truck died.
I'm sad with all my heart
And the driver he tried,
But it just wouldn't start.
The owner who I know
Lives on the other street.
I watched the driver go
Up my road on two feet.
I do not have a car,
Fixing cars not a clue.
Thank God, it isn't far,
Where he has to walk to.
So how will they need me,
Now since there's help out there.
I will look out to see,
If it starts with each prayer.
| Scheme | ABAB CDCD EFEF GHGH |
|---|---|
| Poetic Form | Traditional rhyme Quatrain |
| Metre | 1010111 111111 001011 111101 010111 110101 110101 111111 111101 101101 111101 111111 111111 111111 111111 111111 |
| Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
| Characters | 417 |
| Words | 103 |
| Sentences | 8 |
| Stanzas | 4 |
| Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4 |
| Lines Amount | 16 |
| Letters per line (avg) | 19 |
| Words per line (avg) | 6 |
| Letters per stanza (avg) | 77 |
| Words per stanza (avg) | 22 |
About this poem
Garbage man's truck driver
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"The Thing That's Missing" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 10 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/183151/the-thing-that%27s-missing>.
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