The Sultan's Palace Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABAB CBCB BDBE FGFG HIHI BIBB HJHK BHBH BIBI BLBL BHBH BDBD MBMB NONO BGBG IPIQ RSRS EIEI TGTG UVUV BIBI HIHI| My spirit only lived to look on Beauty's face | A |
| As only when they clasp the arms seem served aright | B |
| As in their flesh inheres the impulse to embrace | A |
| To gaze on Loveliness was my soul's appetite | B |
| - | |
| I have roamed far in search white road and plunging bow | C |
| Were keys in the blue doors where my desire was set | B |
| Obedient to their lure my lips and laughing brow | C |
| The hill showers and the spray of many seas have wet | B |
| - | |
| Hot are enamored hands the fragrant zone unbound | B |
| To leave no dear delight unfelt unfondled o'er | D |
| The will possessed my heart to girdle Earth around | B |
| With their insatiate need to wonder and adore | E |
| - | |
| The flowers in the fields the surf upon the sands | F |
| The sunset and the clouds it turned to blood and wine | G |
| Were shreds of the thin veil behind whose beaded strands | F |
| A radiant visage rose serene august divine | G |
| - | |
| A noise of summer wind astir in starlit trees | H |
| A song where sensual love's delirium rose and fell | I |
| Were rites that moved my soul more than the devotee's | H |
| When from the blazing choir rings out the altar bell | I |
| - | |
| I woke amid the pomp of a proud palace writ | B |
| In tinted arabesque on walls that gems o'erlay | I |
| The names of caliphs were who once held court in it | B |
| Their baths and bowers were mine to dwell in for a day | B |
| - | |
| Their robes and rings were mine to draw from shimmering trays | H |
| Brocades and broidered silks topaz and tourmaline | J |
| Their turban cloths to wind in proud capricious ways | H |
| And fasten plumes and pearls and pendent sapphires in | K |
| - | |
| I rose far music drew my steps in fond pursuit | B |
| Down tessellated floors and towering peristyles | H |
| Through groves of colonnades fair lamps were blushing fruit | B |
| On seas of green mosaic soft rugs were flowery isles | H |
| - | |
| And there were verdurous courts that scalloped arches wreathed | B |
| Where fountains plashed in bowls of lapis lazuli | I |
| Through enigmatic doors voluptuous accents breathed | B |
| And having Youth I had their Open Sesame | I |
| - | |
| I paused where shadowy walls were hung with cloths of gold | B |
| And tinted twilight streamed through storied panes above | L |
| In lamplit alcoves deep as flowers when they unfold | B |
| Soft cushions called to rest and fragrant fumes to love | L |
| - | |
| I hungered at my hand delicious dainties teemed | B |
| Fair pyramids of fruit pastry in sugared piles | H |
| I thirsted in cool cups inviting vintage beamed | B |
| Sweet syrups from the South brown muscat from the isles | H |
| - | |
| I yearned for passionate Love faint gauzes fell away | B |
| Pillowed in rosy light I found my heart's desire | D |
| Over the silks and down her florid beauty lay | B |
| As over orient clouds the sunset's coral fire | D |
| - | |
| Joys that had smiled afar a visionary form | M |
| Behind the ranges hid remote and rainbow dyed | B |
| Drew near unto my heart a wonder soft and warm | M |
| To touch to stroke to clasp to sleep and wake beside | B |
| - | |
| Joy that where summer seas and hot horizons shone | N |
| Had been the outspread arms I gave my youth to seek | O |
| Drew near awhile its pulse strove sweetly with my own | N |
| Awhile I felt its breath astir upon my cheek | O |
| - | |
| I was so happy there so fleeting was my stay | B |
| What wonder if assailed with vistas so divine | G |
| I only lived to search and sample them the day | B |
| When between dawn and dusk the sultan's courts were mine | G |
| - | |
| Speak not of other worlds of happiness to be | I |
| As though in any fond imaginary sphere | P |
| Lay more to tempt man's soul to immortality | I |
| Than ripens for his bliss abundant now and here | Q |
| - | |
| Flowerlike I hope to die as flowerlike was my birth | R |
| Rooted in Nature's just benignant law like them | S |
| I want no better joys than those that from green Earth | R |
| My spirit's blossom drew through the sweet body's stem | S |
| - | |
| I see no dread in death no horror to abhor | E |
| I never thought it else than but to cease to dwell | I |
| Spectator and resolve most naturally once more | E |
| Into the dearly loved eternal spectacle | I |
| - | |
| Unto the fields and flowers this flesh I found so fair | T |
| I yield do you dear friend over your rose crowned wine | G |
| Murmur my name some day as though my lips were there | T |
| And frame your mouth as though its blushing kiss were mine | G |
| - | |
| Yea where the banquet hall is brilliant with young men | U |
| You whose bright youth it might have thrilled my breast to know | V |
| Drink and perhaps my lips insatiate even then | U |
| Of lips to hang upon may find their loved ones so | V |
| - | |
| Unto the flush of dawn and evening I commend | B |
| This immaterial self and flamelike part of me | I |
| Unto the azure haze that hangs at the world's end | B |
| The sunshine on the hills the starlight on the sea | I |
| - | |
| Unto angelic Earth whereof the lives of those | H |
| Who love and dream great dreams and deeply feel may be | I |
| The elemental cells and nervules that compose | H |
| Its divine consciousness and joy and harmony | I |
Alan Seeger
(1)
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