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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


PEDOMETER by CHRISTOPHER DARLINGTON MORLEY

Poet Analysis

First Line: MY THOUGHTS BEAT OUT IN SONNETS WHILE I WALK
Last Line: O MARVELLOUS TO STRIDE AND BROOD UPON IT!
Subject(s): WALKING;

MY thoughts beat out in sonnets while I walk,
And every evening on the homeward street
I find the rhythm of my marching feet
Throbs into verses (though the rhyme may balk).
I think the sonneteers were walking men:
The form is dour and rigid, like a clamp,
But with the swing of legs the tramp, tramp, tramp
Of syllables begins to thud, and then --
Lo! while you seek a rhyme for @3hook@1 or @3crook@1
Vanished your shabby coat, and you are kith
To all great walk-and-singers -- Meredith,
And Shakespeare, Wordsworth, Keats, and Rupert Brooke!
Free verse is poor for walking, but a sonnet --
O marvellous to stride and brood upon it!



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