"The Bean Eaters" does not follow any formal scheme of rhyme and meter, but Brooks makes extensive use of rhyme over the course of its eleven lines. The end-rhymes follow the pattern aaba bcdc eff, meaning that the poem begins and ends with a couplet. This unusual arrangement emphasizes that the poem is about a couple, particularly as the first rhymed word is "pair." A rhyme is itself a pairing, and the pair described here are so inextricably linked that every statement the poet makes refers to both of them.

This point about the unity of the old couple is made again with the internal rhymes of the second stanza:

Two who are Mostly Good.
Two who have lived their day ...