A Defence Of English Spring Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABCDDEEFFGGHH IIJJKKLLMMNNOO IIPPQQJJEERRSSEEISEE BBTTEEUUEEVVWWSSWWWE EXXLL YYZZSSEEEEMMPPSSA2A2 LLVVEEB2B2C2C2XX MMD2D2E2E2F2F2SSEEFF EEEEWA2MMMMMMSSSSLL C2C2VVEEMMEESSG2G2EE MMSSSSEEH2H2PPC2C2B2 B2MMIII2J2H2H2MMMMMM EESSEEEEK2K2 EEL2L2M2M2SSEESSBBIX XMMN2N2A2A2O2O2SSO2| Unnamed unknown but surely bred | A |
| Where Thames once silver now runs lead | A |
| Whose journeys daily ebb and flow | B |
| 'Twixt Tyburn and the bells of Bow | C |
| You late in learn d prose have told | D |
| How for the happy bards of old | D |
| Spring burst upon Sicilian seas | E |
| Or blossomed in the Cyclades | E |
| But never yet hath deigned to smile | F |
| On poets of this shivering isle | F |
| Who when to vernal strains they melt | G |
| Discourse of joys they never felt | G |
| And pilfering from each other's page | H |
| Pass on the lie from age to age | H |
| - | |
| Well now in turn give ear to me | I |
| Who with your leave friend claim to be | I |
| Degenerate but withal allied | J |
| At least on mother Nature's side | J |
| To Chaucer Spenser Shakespeare all | K |
| Foremost or hindmost great or small | K |
| My kindred and whose numbers ring | L |
| With woodnotes of the English Spring | L |
| Leave for awhile your polished town | M |
| Unto my rural home come down | M |
| Where you shall find such bed and board | N |
| As rude bucolic roofs afford | N |
| And judge with your own ear and eye | O |
| If Spring exists or poets lie | O |
| - | |
| Welcome Now plunge at once with me | I |
| Into the nearest copse you see | I |
| The boles are brown the branches gray | P |
| Yet green buds live on every spray | P |
| But 'tis the ground most wins your gaze | Q |
| And makes you question with amaze | Q |
| What these are Shells flung far and wide | J |
| By Winter's now fast ebbing tide | J |
| In language called for him who sees | E |
| But grossly wood anemones | E |
| Those too Nay pluck not You will find | R |
| That they maintain a silent mind | R |
| You do not understand I meant | S |
| They will not talk to you in scent | S |
| Sweet violets you know but these | E |
| Have their own rustic way to please | E |
| Their charm is in their look their free | I |
| Unfrightened gaze of gaiety | S |
| Are they not everywhere Their eyes | E |
| Glance up to the cerulean skies | E |
| And challenge them to match the glow | B |
| Of their own bluer heaven below | B |
| Anon the trunks and boughs fall back | T |
| And along winding track on track | T |
| Lo wheresoe'er you onward press | E |
| Shine milky ways of primroses | E |
| So thick there are when these have birth | U |
| Far fewer stars in heaven than earth | U |
| You know them for their face one meets | E |
| Still smiling in your London streets | E |
| And one I loved but who with Fame | V |
| Sleeps quiet now hath made their name | V |
| Even for those alas who share | W |
| No fellowship with woodlands fair | W |
| Wherever English speech is heard | S |
| A meaning sound a grateful word | S |
| Yet unto me they seem when there | W |
| Like young things that should be elsewhere | W |
| In lanes in dells in rustic air | W |
| But looked on here where they have space | E |
| To peep from every sheltered place | E |
| Their simple open faces seem | X |
| Or doth again a poet dream | X |
| The wondering soul of child like Spring | L |
| Inquisitive of everything | L |
| - | |
| Now frowns the sky the air bites bleak | Y |
| The young boughs rock the old trunks creak | Y |
| And fast before the following gale | Z |
| Come slanting drops then slashing hail | Z |
| As keen as sword as thick as shot | S |
| Nay do not cower but heed them not | S |
| For these one neither flies nor stirs | E |
| They are but April skirmishers | E |
| Thrown out to cover the advance | E |
| Of gleaming spear and glittering lance | E |
| With which the sunshine scours amain | M |
| Heaven earth and air and routs the rain | M |
| See how the sparkling branches sway | P |
| And laughing shake the drops away | P |
| While glimmering through the meads beyond | S |
| Are emerald and diamond | S |
| And hark behind baptismal shower | A2 |
| Whose drops new poured on leaf and flower | A2 |
| Unto their infant faces cling | L |
| The cuckoo sponsor of the Spring | L |
| Breaks in and strives with loud acclaim | V |
| To christen it with his own name | V |
| Now he begins he will not cease | E |
| Nor leave the woodlands any peace | E |
| That have to listen all day long | B2 |
| To him reciting his one song | B2 |
| And oft you may when all is still | C2 |
| And night lies smooth on vale and hill | C2 |
| Hear him call Cuckoo '' in his dream | X |
| Still haunted by the egoist theme | X |
| - | |
| Out of the wood now and we gain | M |
| The freedom of the winding lane | M |
| Push through the open gap and leap | D2 |
| What have you tumbled all aheap | D2 |
| Only a scratch See ditch and bank | E2 |
| With the same flowers are lush and rank | E2 |
| With more beside As yet but single | F2 |
| The bluebells with the grasses mingle | F2 |
| But soon their azure will be scrolled | S |
| Upon the primrose cloth of gold | S |
| Yes those are early ladysmocks | E |
| The children crumple in their frocks | E |
| And carry many a zigzag mile | F |
| O'er meadow footpath gate and stile | F |
| To stick in pots and jugs to dress | E |
| Their cottage sills and lattices | E |
| As yet they only fleck the grass | E |
| But again hither shortly pass | E |
| And with them knolls that now are bare | W |
| Will be a blaze of lavender | A2 |
| What lends yon dingle such a sheen | M |
| How Buttercups No celandine | M |
| Complete in its own self each one | M |
| A looking glass is for the sun | M |
| Soon as his waking hours begin | M |
| To see his own effulgence in | M |
| Crave you for brighter still behold | S |
| Yon clusters of marsh marigold | S |
| This is our rustic wealth and found | S |
| Not under but above the ground | S |
| Mines that bring wealth without its sting | L |
| Enrich without impoverishing | L |
| - | |
| Yes Cuckoo cuckoo cuckoo still | C2 |
| Do you not feel an impulse thrill | C2 |
| Your vernal blood to do the same | V |
| And boylike shout him back his name | V |
| But though he loudest longest sings | E |
| Music is shook from myriad wings | E |
| Hear you the lark advancing now | M |
| Through seas of air with rippling prow | M |
| They say that from the poet's tears | E |
| Spring sweetest songs for unseen ears | E |
| And from its moist and lowly bed | S |
| The lark mounts up aloft to shed | S |
| In heavenly fields beyond our view | G2 |
| Music still drenched with earthly dew | G2 |
| The robin that in winter cheers | E |
| With his lone voice our lonelier ears | E |
| Though warbling still on neighbouring bough | M |
| Sings all unheard unnoticed now | M |
| Chatter the jays the starlings flute | S |
| There's not a single throat that's mute | S |
| From tree to tree the finches flit | S |
| Nor once their carols intermit | S |
| The willow warbler mounts then drops | E |
| And in his silvery solo stops | E |
| Just as it bubbles to the brim | H2 |
| To hark if any answer him | H2 |
| High on a bare conspicuous spray | P |
| That none may doubt who chants the lay | P |
| Proud of his undisputed skill | C2 |
| To breast whatever note he will | C2 |
| The thrush runs revelling all along | B2 |
| The spacious gamut of his song | B2 |
| Varies inverts repeats the strain | M |
| Then sings it different again | M |
| The blackbird less expert than he | I |
| Coaxes and scolds alternately | I |
| Then with a sudden scream and rush | I2 |
| Is off into another bush | J2 |
| Feigning to fear for life and limb | H2 |
| Though none have interfered with him | H2 |
| But listen ne'er on urban bough | M |
| Was perched the note you caught just now | M |
| Hush move a little down the lane | M |
| When we have passed he'll start again | M |
| There Did you ever hear a strain | M |
| Of such apotheosized pain | M |
| Such sadness almost sung to bliss | E |
| Blending of woe and joy like this | E |
| Yes he descants all day despite | S |
| The name he borrows from the night | S |
| Though then perchance the wails increase | E |
| When doth true anguish ever cease | E |
| He is the poet bird that sings | E |
| Through joy through sorrow through all things | E |
| 'Tis only we that do not hark | K2 |
| Until our own bright days grow dark | K2 |
| - | |
| Now think you that I gleaned all this | E |
| This mite of wisdom wealth of bliss | E |
| In dusty shelf and yellowing tome | L2 |
| Is it not rather that I roam | L2 |
| From dawn to noon from noon till eve | M2 |
| Ready to gladden or to grieve | M2 |
| With every aspect impulse mood | S |
| Of Nature's active solitude | S |
| Ah if you knew the hours on hours | E |
| One lives with birds one spends with flowers | E |
| How many a time one's eyes grow wet | S |
| By gazing on the violet | S |
| How often all one has to show | B |
| For days that come and days that go | B |
| Are woodland nosegays all ablow | I |
| You then I think would scarcely deem | X |
| One's songs of Spring a borrowed theme | X |
| But own that English poets learn | M |
| In every hour at every turn | M |
| From Nature's page from Nature's speech | N2 |
| What neither book nor bard can teach | N2 |
| Nor deem this pride I am to her | A2 |
| A student and interpreter | A2 |
| Loving to read what lessons lurk | O2 |
| In her unlettered handiwork | O2 |
| To find the helpful meanings writ | S |
| In waves that break in clouds that flit | S |
| Some balm extrac | O2 |
Alfred Austin
(1)
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