This is an analysis of the poem My Father Was A Farmer: A Ballad that begins with:

MY father was a farmer upon the Carrick border, O,
And carefully he bred me in decency and order, O;... full text

Elements of the verse: questions and answers

The information we provided is prepared by means of a special computer program. Use the criteria sheet to understand greatest poems or improve your poetry analysis essay.

  • Rhyme scheme: aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa Xaaaa
  • Stanza lengths (in strings): 4,4,4,4,4,4,4,4,5,
  • Closest metre: iambic pentameter
  • Сlosest rhyme: rondeau rhyme
  • Сlosest stanza type: tercets
  • Guessed form: blank verse
  • Metre: 110101001010101 110011101001101 1111010111110101 10111010111110101 11000111100101 1001111110011101 1101010111110101 0111110101110101 01001110111010101 1101110101110101 0111111000001110101 1111110111110101 11011101101010101 1111110111000101 0111101010011011 100110101111110101 1111111111000111 1111111111100111 0111011111011101 11110111101110101 1101011111010101 1111011101010101 11111110011111101 1101111101000101 11011111101100101 1101111101010101 1101110111110101 11101011111110101 101111111010101 110101011000111 10011101111000101 1110110111010101 11110111001010101 0100111111110101 1101100111000111 0101010110010111
  • Amount of stanzas: 9
  • Average number of symbols per stanza: 254
  • Average number of words per stanza: 50
  • Amount of lines: 44
  • Average number of symbols per line: 51 (strings are more long than medium ones)
  • Average number of words per line: 10
  • Mood of the speaker:

    The punctuation marks are various. Neither mark predominates.

  • The author used lexical repetitions to emphasize a significant image; o, my, to, and, me, nor, i, as, you are repeated.

    There is a poetic device epiphora at the end of some neighboring lines o is repeated).

    The poet repeated the same word o at the end of some neighboring stanzas. The poetic device is a kind of epiphora.

If you write a school or university poetry essay, you should Include in your explanation of the poem:

  • summary of My Father Was A Farmer: A Ballad;
  • central theme;
  • idea of the verse;
  • history of its creation;
  • critical appreciation.

Good luck in your poetry interpretation practice!

More information about poems by Robert Burns