Cottonmouth Country

This poem in it's entirety is one stanza with eight lines. The lines are written in Iambic Pentameter, I believe, because each line has five stressed syllables...or at least lines 1,3, and 5. The rhyme scheme goes: ABABCDCD, but if seen as slant rhyming could be:ABABACAC. In either case, I think this breaks the poem into two four-line stanzas without actually doing so in the structure. I think Gluck did this so the poem wouldn't have a normal, structured look, but then was well-thought an organized once it was analyzed. I looked up "Hatteras" and it is a city in North Carolina, and is apparently famous for their yachts, but I don't think that really makes a difference. But it is a coastal town, hence the fish bones. I think the fish bones represent death by water and the Cottonmouth Snake, by land. The poem says that they "Woo" us towards death, but it is actually birth that is the burden. Maye this poem is trying to say that life is the actual punishment and death is either tempting or divine in some way. So the last line is confirming that the narrator (the snake) knows of rebirth because it has been born into a new skin by shedding its old one. This is the real burden. I think Gluck definitely takes a unique tand on life and death if I'm analyzing this correctly.