The Defeat Of Youth Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BCDBEFFEDDGHGHI JKKJLMMLBBNONO I BPBPQBQBRRSBSBT MCCMDUUDBBCCCC D LVVLWXXWYYBKBKZ VA2A2VCDB2CBBC2D2C2D 2 D DCCB2BRRBE2E2F2G2F2G 2B BH2H2BDHHDI2I2WJ2WC2 D I2K2K2I2L2DDL2M2M2CD CDN2 O2I2I2O2DDDDP2P2DQ2D Q2 D N2DDN2R2CCR2DDK2RS2R D CDDCT2U2U2T2DDRDRD D RDDRV2W2W2V2A2A2RDRD D DDPA2X2X2A2LLDA2DA2 D MA2B2MA2A2A2A2DDDPD D CA2A2CDA2A2DV2V2A2DA 2D Y2 Y2A2A2Y2DDDDA2A2Z2A2 Z2 D A2A2A2A2A3RRA3B3B3A2 DA2D D K2A2A2K2A2A2A2A2DDDD D A2 CDDCCRRCDDA2DA2D D DA2A2DC3A2A2C3D3E3A2 DA2DA2 DK2K2DA2V2V2A2F3F3A2 A2A2G3A2I UNDER THE TREES | A |
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There had been phantoms pale remembered shapes | B |
Of this and this occasion sisterly | C |
In their resemblances each effigy | D |
Crowned with the same bright hair above the nape's | B |
White rounded firmness and each body alert | E |
With such swift loveliness that very rest | F |
Seemed a poised movement phantoms that impressed | F |
But a faint influence and could bless or hurt | E |
No more than dreams And these ghost things were she | D |
For formless still without identity | D |
Not one she seemed not clear but many and dim | G |
One face among the legions of the street | H |
Indifferent mystery she was for him | G |
Something still uncreated incomplete | H |
II | I |
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Bright windy sunshine and the shadow of cloud | J |
Quicken the heavy summer to new birth | K |
Of life and motion on the drowsing earth | K |
The huge elms stir till all the air is loud | J |
With their awakening from the muffled sleep | L |
Of long hot days And on the wavering line | M |
That marks the alternate ebb of shade and shine | M |
Under the trees a little group is deep | L |
In laughing talk The shadow as it flows | B |
Across them dims the lustre of a rose | B |
Quenches the bright clear gold of hair the green | N |
Of a girl's dress and life seems faint The light | O |
Swings back and in the rose a fire is seen | N |
Gold hair's aflame and green grows emerald bright | O |
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III | I |
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She leans and there is laughter in the face | B |
She turns towards him and it seems a door | P |
Suddenly opened on some desolate place | B |
With a burst of light and music What before | P |
Was hidden shines in loveliness revealed | Q |
Now first he sees her beautiful and knows | B |
That he must love her and the doom is sealed | Q |
Of all his happiness and all the woes | B |
That shall be born of pregnant years hereafter | R |
The swift poise of a head a flutter of laughter | R |
And love flows in on him its vastness pent | S |
Within his narrow life the pain it brings | B |
Boundless for love is infinite discontent | S |
With the poor lonely life of transient things | B |
IV | T |
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Men see their god an immanence divine | M |
Smile through the curve of flesh or moulded clay | C |
In bare ploughed lands that go sloping away | C |
To meet the sky in one clean exquisite line | M |
Out of the short seen dawns of ecstasy | D |
They draw new beauty whence new thoughts are born | U |
And in their turn conceive as grains of corn | U |
Germ and create new life and endlessly | D |
Shall live creating Out of earthly seeds | B |
Springs the aerial flower One spirit proceeds | B |
Through change the same in body and in soul | C |
The spirit of life and love that triumphs still | C |
In its slow struggle towards some far off goal | C |
Through lust and death and the bitterness of will | C |
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V | D |
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One spirit it is that stirs the fathomless deep | L |
Of human minds that shakes the elms in storm | V |
That sings in passionate music or on warm | V |
Still evenings bosoms forth the tufted sleep | L |
Of thistle seeds that wait a travelling wind | W |
One spirit shapes the subtle rhythms of thought | X |
And the long thundering seas the soul is wrought | X |
Of one stuff with the body matter and mind | W |
Woven together in so close a mesh | Y |
That flowers may blossom into a song that flesh | Y |
May strangely teach the loveliest holiest things | B |
To watching spirits Truth is brought to birth | K |
Not in some vacant heaven its beauty springs | B |
From the dear bosom of material earth | K |
VI IN THE HAY LOFT | Z |
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The darkness in the loft is sweet and warm | V |
With the stored hay darkness intensified | A2 |
By one bright shaft that enters through the wide | A2 |
Tall doors from under fringes of a storm | V |
Which makes the doomed sun brighter On the hay | C |
Perched mountain high they sit and silently | D |
Watch the motes dance and look at the dark sky | B2 |
And mark how heartbreakingly far away | C |
And yet how close and clear the distance seems | B |
While all at hand is cloud brightness of dreams | B |
Unrealisable yet seen so clear | C2 |
So only just beyond the dark They wait | D2 |
Scarce knowing what they wait for half in fear | C2 |
Expectance draws the curtain from their fate | D2 |
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VII | D |
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The silence of the storm weighs heavily | D |
On their strained spirits sometimes one will say | C |
Some trivial thing as though to ward away | C |
Mysterious powers that imminently lie | B2 |
In wait with the strong exorcising grace | B |
Of everyday's futility Desire | R |
Becomes upon a sudden a crystal fire | R |
Defined and hard If he could kiss her face | B |
Could kiss her hair As if by chance her hand | E2 |
Brushes on his Ah can she understand | E2 |
Or is she pedestalled above the touch | F2 |
Of his desire He wonders dare he seek | G2 |
From her that little that infinitely much | F2 |
And suddenly she kissed him on the cheek | G2 |
VIII MOUNTAINS | B |
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A stronger gust catches the cloud and twists | B |
A spindle of rifted darkness through its heart | H2 |
A gash in the damp grey which thrust apart | H2 |
Reveals black depths a moment Then the mists | B |
Shut down again a white uneasy sea | D |
Heaves round the climbers and beneath their feet | H |
He strains on upwards through the wind and sleet | H |
Poised or swift moving or laboriously | D |
Lifting his weight And if he should let go | I2 |
What would he find down there down there below | I2 |
The curtain of the mist What would he find | W |
Beyond the dim and stifling now and here | J2 |
Beneath the unsettled turmoil of his mind | W |
Oh there were nameless depths he shrank with fear | C2 |
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IX | D |
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The hills more glorious in their coat of snow | I2 |
Rise all around him in the valleys run | K2 |
Bright streams and there are lakes that catch the sun | K2 |
And sunlit fields of emerald far below | I2 |
That seem alive with inward light In smoke | L2 |
The far horizons fade and there is peace | D |
On everything a sense of blessed release | D |
From wilful strife Like some prophetic cloak | L2 |
The spirit of the mountains has descended | M2 |
On all the world and its unrest is ended | M2 |
Even the sea glimpsed far away seems still | C |
Hushed to a silver peace its storm and strife | D |
Mountains of vision calm above fate and will | C |
You hold the promise of the freer life | D |
X IN THE LITTLE ROOM | N2 |
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London unfurls its incense coloured dusk | O2 |
Before the panes rich but a while ago | I2 |
With the charred gold and the red ember glow | I2 |
Of dying sunset Houses quit the husk | O2 |
Of secrecy which through the day returns | D |
A blank to all enquiry but at nights | D |
The cheerfulness of fire and lamp invites | D |
The darkness inward curious of what burns | D |
With such a coloured life when all is dead | P2 |
The daylight world outside with overhead | P2 |
White clouds and where we walk the blaze | D |
Of wet and sunlit streets shops and the stream | Q2 |
Of glittering traffic all that the nights erase | D |
Colour and speed surviving but in dream | Q2 |
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XI | D |
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Outside the dusk but in the little room | N2 |
All is alive with light which brightly glints | D |
On curving cup or the stiff folds of chintz | D |
Evoking its own whiteness Shadows loom | N2 |
Bulging and black upon the walls where hang | R2 |
Rich coloured plates of beauties that appeal | C |
Less to the sense of sight than to the feel | C |
So moistly satin are their breasts A pang | R2 |
Almost of pain runs through him when he sees | D |
Hanging a homeless marvel next to these | D |
The silken breastplate of a mandarin | K2 |
Centuries dead which he had given her | R |
Exquisite miracle when men could spin | S2 |
Jay's wing and belly of the kingfisher | R |
XII | D |
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In silence and as though expectantly | C |
She crouches at his feet while he caresses | D |
His light drawn fingers with the touch of tresses | D |
Sleeked round her head close banded lustrously | C |
Save where at nape and temple the smooth brown | T2 |
Sleaves out into a pale transparent mist | U2 |
Of hair and tangled light So to exist | U2 |
Poised 'twixt the deep of thought where spirits drown | T2 |
Life in a void impalpable nothingness | D |
And on the other side the pain and stress | D |
Of clamorous action and the gnawing fire | R |
Of will focal upon a point of earth even thus | D |
To sit eternally without desire | R |
And yet self known were happiness for us | D |
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XIII | D |
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She turns her head and in a flash of laughter | R |
Looks up at him and helplessly he feels | D |
That life has circled with returning wheels | D |
Back to a starting point Before and after | R |
Merge in this instant momently the same | V2 |
For it was thus she leaned and laughing turned | W2 |
When manifest the spirit of beauty burned | W2 |
In her young body with an inward flame | V2 |
And first he knew and loved her In full tide | A2 |
Life halts within him suddenly stupefied | A2 |
Sight blackness lightning struck but blindly tender | R |
He draws her up to meet him and she lies | D |
Close folded by his arms in glad surrender | R |
Smiling and with drooped head and half closed eyes | D |
XIV | D |
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'I give you all would that I might give more ' | - |
He sees the colour dawn across her cheeks | D |
And die again to white marks as she speaks | D |
The trembling of her lips as though she bore | P |
Some sudden pain and hardly mastered it | A2 |
Within his arms he feels her shuddering | X2 |
Piteously trembling like some wild wood thing | X2 |
Caught unawares Compassion infinite | A2 |
Mounts up within him Thus to hold and keep | L |
And comfort her distressed lull her to sleep | L |
And gently kiss her brow and hair and eyes | D |
Seems love perfected templed high and white | A2 |
Against the calm of golden autumn skies | D |
And shining quenchlessly with vestal light | A2 |
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XV | D |
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But passion ambushed by the aerial shrine | M |
Comes forth to dance a hoofed obscenity | A2 |
His satyr's dance with laughter in his eye | B2 |
And cruelty along the scarlet line | M |
Of his bright smiling mouth All uncontrolled | A2 |
Love's rebel servant he delights to beat | A2 |
The maddening quick dry rhythm of goatish feet | A2 |
Even in the sanctuary and makes bold | A2 |
To mime himself the godhead of the place | D |
He turns in terror from her trance calmed face | D |
From the white lidded languor of her eyes | D |
From lips that passion never shook before | P |
But glad in the promise of her sacrifice | D |
'I give you all would that I might give more ' | - |
XVI | D |
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He is afraid seeing her lie so still | C |
So utterly his own afraid lest she | A2 |
Should open wide her eyes and let him see | A2 |
The passionate conquest of her virgin will | C |
Shine there in triumph starry bright with tears | D |
He thrusts her from him face and hair and breast | A2 |
Hands he had touched lips that his lips had pressed | A2 |
Seem things deadly to be desired He fears | D |
Lest she should body forth in palpable shame | V2 |
Those dreams and longings that his blood aflame | V2 |
Through the hot dark of summer nights had dreamed | A2 |
And longed Must all his love then turn to this | D |
Was lust the end of what so pure had seemed | A2 |
He must escape ah God her touch her kiss | D |
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XVII IN THE PARK | Y2 |
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Laughing 'To night ' I said to him 'the Park | Y2 |
Has turned the garden of a symbolist | A2 |
Those old great trees that rise above the mist | A2 |
Gold with the light of evening and the dark | Y2 |
Still water where the dying sun evokes | D |
An echoed glory here I recognize | D |
Those ancient gardens mirrored by the eyes | D |
Of poets that hate the world of common folks | D |
Like you and me and that thin pious crowd | A2 |
Which yonder sings its hymns so humbly proud | A2 |
Of holiness The garden of escape | Z2 |
Lies here a small green world and still the bride | A2 |
Of quietness although an imminent rape | Z2 |
Roars ceaselessly about on every side ' | - |
XVIII | D |
- | |
I had forgotten what I had lightly said | A2 |
And without speech without a thought I went | A2 |
Steeped in that golden quiet all content | A2 |
To drink the transient beauty as it sped | A2 |
Out of eternal darkness into time | A3 |
To light and burn and know itself a fire | R |
Yet doomed ah fate of the fulfilled desire | R |
To fade a meteor paying for the crime | A3 |
Of living glorious in the denser air | B3 |
Of our material earth A strange despair | B3 |
An agony yet strangely subtly sweet | A2 |
And tender as an unpassionate caress | D |
Filled me Oh laughter youth's conceit | A2 |
Grown almost conscious of youth's feebleness | D |
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XIX | D |
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He spoke abrupt across my dream 'Dear Garden | K2 |
A stranger to your magic peace I stand | A2 |
Beyond your walls lost in a fevered land | A2 |
Of stones and fire Would that the gods would harden | K2 |
My soul against its torment or would blind | A2 |
Those yearning glimpses of a life at rest | A2 |
In perfect beauty glimpses at the best | A2 |
Through unpassed bars And here without the wind | A2 |
Of scattering passion blows and women pass | D |
Glitter eyed down putrid alleys where the glass | D |
Of some grimed window suddenly parades | D |
Ah sickening heart beat of desire the grace | D |
Of bare and milk warm flesh the vision fades | D |
And at the pane shows a blind tortured face ' | - |
XX SELF TORMENT | A2 |
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The days pass by empty of thought and will | C |
His thought grows stagnant at its very springs | D |
With every channel on the world of things | D |
Dammed up and thus by its long standing still | C |
Poisons itself and sickens to decay | C |
All his high love for her his fair desire | R |
Loses its light and a dull rancorous fire | R |
Burning darkness and bitterness that prey | C |
Upon his heart are left His spirit burns | D |
Sometimes with hatred or the hatred turns | D |
To a fierce lust for her more cruel than hate | A2 |
Till he is weary wrestling with its force | D |
And evermore she haunts him early and late | A2 |
As pitilessly as an old remorse | D |
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XXI | D |
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Streets and the solitude of country places | D |
Were once his friends But as a man born blind | A2 |
Opening his eyes from lovely dreams might find | A2 |
The world a desert and men's larval faces | D |
So hateful he would wish to seek again | C3 |
The darkness and his old chimeric sight | A2 |
Of beauties inward so that fresh delight | A2 |
Vision of bright fields and angelic men | C3 |
That love which made him all the world is gone | D3 |
Hating and hated now he stands alone | E3 |
An island point measureless gulfs apart | A2 |
From other lives from the old happiness | D |
Of being more than self when heart to heart | A2 |
Gave all yet grew the greater not the less | D |
XXII THE QUARRY IN THE WOOD | A2 |
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Swiftly deliberate he seeks the place | D |
A small wind stirs the copse is bright in the sun | K2 |
Like quicksilver the shine and shadow run | K2 |
Across the leaves A bramble whips his face | D |
The tears spring fast and through the rainbow mist | A2 |
He sees a world that wavers like the flame | V2 |
Of a blown candle Tears of pain and shame | V2 |
And lips that once had laughed and sung and kissed | A2 |
Trembling in the passion of his sobbing breath | F3 |
The world a candle shuddering to its death | F3 |
And life a darkness blind and utterly void | A2 |
Of any love or goodness all deceit | A2 |
This friendship and this God all shams destroyed | A2 |
And truth seen now | G3 |
Earth fails beneath his feet | A2 |
Aldous Huxley
(1)
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