We Have Been Friends Together

“We Have Been Friends Together” is composed of 24 lines, which are divided into three stanzas of eight lines each. Norton’s poem can be classified as a ballad based on its form. A ballad is a type of narrative verse that can be either musical or poetic. A ballad’s rhyme scheme is consistent. In each quatrain, or set of four lines, either the first and third line will rhyme (ABAC) or the second and fourth lines will rhyme (ABCB). Norton employs the ABCB rhyme scheme. In the rhyming lines, Norton uses ballad meter, which comprises four lines that alternate between iambic tetrameter (four sets of two syllables, or metrical feet, first unstressed then stressed) in the A and C lines and iambic trimeter (three metrical feet, unstressed then stressed) for the B lines. Ballads also generally employ a repeating line or refrain. In “We Have Been Friends Together,” the first lines of each stanza repeat with only slight variation. Likewise, the last three lines of each stanza are also repeated, with minor but significant changes.