De Te Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABABBCBCC DEDEEFEFF GHGHHIHII BJBJJHJHH KLKLLBLBB BMBMMNONN PQPQQRQRR STUTTBTBB VEVEEOEOO WBWBBBBBBA burning glass of burnished brass | A |
The calm sea caught the noontide rays | B |
And sunny slopes of golden grass | A |
And wastes of weed flower seem to blaze | B |
Beyond the shining silver greys | B |
Beyond the shades of denser bloom | C |
The sky line girt with glowing haze | B |
The farthest faintest forest gloom | C |
And the everlasting hills that loom | C |
- | |
We heard the hound beneath the mound | D |
We scared the swamp hawk hovering nigh | E |
We had not sought for that we found | D |
He lay as dead men only lie | E |
With wan cheek whitening in the sky | E |
Through the wild heath flowers white and red | F |
The dumb brute that had seen him die | E |
Close crouching howl'd beside the head | F |
Brute burial service o'er the dead | F |
- | |
The brow was rife with seams of strife | G |
A lawless death made doubly plain | H |
The ravage of a reckless life | G |
The havoc of a hurricane | H |
Of passions through that breadth of brain | H |
Like headlong horses that had run | I |
Riot regardless of the rein | H |
Madman he might have lived and done | I |
Better than most men whispered one | I |
- | |
The beams and blots that Heaven allots | B |
To every life with life begin | J |
Fool would you change the leopard's spots | B |
Or blanch the Ethiopian's skin | J |
What more could he have hoped to win | J |
What better things have thought to gain | H |
So shapen so conceived in sin | J |
No life is wholly void and vain | H |
Just and unjust share sun and rain | H |
- | |
Were new life sent and life misspent | K |
Wiped out if such to God seemed good | L |
Would he being as he was repent | K |
Or could he even if he would | L |
Who heeded not things understood | L |
Though dimly even in savage lands | B |
By some who worship stone or wood | L |
Or bird or beast or who stretch hands | B |
Sunward on shining Eastern sands | B |
- | |
And crime has cause Nay never pause | B |
Idly to feel a pulseless wrist | M |
Brace up the massive square shaped jaws | B |
Unclench the stubborn stiff'ning fist | M |
And close those eyes through film and mist | M |
That kept the old defiant glare | N |
And answer wise Psychologist | O |
Whose science claims some little share | N |
Of truth what better things lay there | N |
- | |
Aye thought and mind were there some kind | P |
Of faculty that men mistake | Q |
For talent when their wits are blind | P |
An aptitude to mar and break | Q |
What others diligently make | Q |
This was the worst and best of him | R |
Wise with the cunning of the snake | Q |
Brave with the she wolf's courage grim | R |
Dying hard and dumb torn limb from limb | R |
- | |
And you Brown you're a doctor cure | S |
You can't but you can kill and he | T |
Witness his mark he signed last year | U |
And now he signs John Smith J P | T |
We'll hold our inquest now we three | T |
I'll be your coroner for once | B |
I think old Oswald ought to be | T |
Our foreman Jones is such a dunce | B |
There's more brain in the bloodhound's sconce | B |
- | |
No man may shirk the allotted work | V |
The deed to do the death to die | E |
At least I think so neither Turk | V |
Nor Jew nor infidel am I | E |
And yet I wonder when I try | E |
To solve one question may or must | O |
And shall I solve it by and by | E |
Beyond the dark beneath the dust | O |
I trust so and I only trust | O |
- | |
Aye what they will such trifles kill | W |
Comrade for one good deed of yours | B |
Your history shall not help to fill | W |
The mouths of many brainless boors | B |
It may be death absolves or cures | B |
The sin of life 'Twere hazardous | B |
To assert so If the sin endures | B |
Say only God who has judged him thus | B |
Be merciful to him and us | B |
Adam Lindsay Gordon
(1)
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