The Ballad Of Dick Turpin Poem Rhyme Scheme

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The daylight moon looked quietly down	A
Through the gathering dusk on London town	A
	-
A smock frocked yokel hobbled along	B
By Newgate humming a country song	B
	-
Chewing a straw he stood to stare	C
At the proclamation posted there	C
	-
Three hundred guineas on Turpins head	D
Trap him alive or shoot him dead	D
And a hundred more for his mate Tom King	E
	-
He crouched like a tiger about to spring	E
Then he looked up and he looked down	A
And chuckling low like a country clown	A
	-
Dick Turpin painfully hobbled away	F
In quest of his inn The Load of Hay	F
	-
Alone in her stall his mare Black Bess	G
Lifted her head in mute distress	G
For five strange men had entered the yard	H
And looked at her long and looked at her hard	H
	-
They went out muttering under their breath	I
And then the dusk grew still as death	I
	-
But the velvet ears of the listening mare	C
Lifted and twitched They were there still there	C
	-
Hidden and waiting for whom And why	J
The clock struck four a set drew nigh	J
	-
It was King Dick Turpins mate	K
The black mare whinnied Too late Too late	K
	-
They rose like shadows out of the ground	L
And grappled him there without a sound	L
	-
Throttle him quietly choke him dead	D
Or we lose this hawk for a jay they said	D
	-
They wrestled and heaved five men to one	M
And a yokel entered the yard alone	N
	-
A smock frocked yokel hobbling slow	O
But a fight is physic as all men know	O
	-
His age dropped off he stood upright	P
He leapt like a tiger into the fight	P
	-
Hand to hand they fought in the dark	Q
For none could fire at a twisting mark	Q
	-
Where he that shot at a foe might send	R
His pistol ball through the skull of a friend	R
	-
But Shoot Dick Shoot gasped out Tom King	E
Shoot Or damn it we both shall swing	E
Shoot and chance it Dick leapt back	S
	-
He drew He fired At the pistols crack	S
The wrestlers whirled They scattered apart	T
And the bullet drilled through Tom Kings heart	T
	-
Dick Turpin dropped his smoking gun	M
They had trapped him five men to one	M
	-
A gun in the hand of the crouching five	U
They could take Dick Turpin now alive	U
	-
Take him and bind him and tell their tale	V
As a pot house boast when they drank their ale	V
	-
He whistled soft as a bird might call	W
And a head rope snapped in his birds dark stall	W
	-
He whistled soft as a nightingale	V
He heard the swish of her swinging tail	V
	-
There was no way out that the five could see	X
To heaven or hell but the Tyburn tree	X
	-
No door but death and yet once more	Y
He whistled as though at a sweethearts door	Y
	-
The five men laughed at him trapped alive	U
And the door crashed open behind the five	U
	-
Out of the stable a wave of thunder	Z
Swept Black Bess and the five went under	Z
	-
He leapt to the saddle a hoof turned stone	N
Flashed blue fire and their prize was gone	A2
	-
	-
	-
He rode for one impossible thing that in the	B2
morning light	P
The towers of York might waken him	C2
from London and last night	P
	-
He rode to prove himself another	Z
and leave himself behind	D2
And the hunted self was like a cloud	E2
but the hunter like the wind	D2
	-
Neck and neck they rode together	Z
that in the day s first gleam	F2
each might prove that the other self	G2
was but a mocking dream	F2
	-
And the little sleeping villages and the	B2
breathless country side	H2
Woke to the drum of the ghostly hooves	I2
but missed that ghostly ride	H2
	-
The did not see they did not hear as the ghostly	X
hooves drew nigh	J
The dark magnificent thief in the night	P
that rode so subtly by	J
	-
They woke they rushed to the way side door	Y
They saw what the midnight showed	J2
A mare that came like a crested wave	K2
Along the Great North Road	J2
	-
A flying spark in the formless dark	Q
a flash from the hoof spurned stone	N
And the lifted face of a man	L2
that took the starlight and was gone	A2
	-
The heard the sound of a pounding chase	M2
three hundred yards away	F
There were fourteen men in a stream of sweat	N2
and a plaster of Midland clay	F
	-
The starlight struck their pistol butts as they	F
passed in the clattering crowd	E2
But the hunting wraith was away like the wind	D2
at the heels of the hunted cloud	E2
	-
He rode by the walls of Nottingham	O2
and over him as he went	P2
Like ghosts across the Great North Road	J2
the boughs of Sherwood bent	P2
	-
By Bawtry all the chase but one has dropped	Q2
a league behind	D2
Yet one rider haunted him invisibly as the wind	D2
	-
And northward like a blacker night he saw the moors up loom	R2
And Don and Derwent sang to him like memory in the gloom	R2
	-
And northward northward as he rode and sweeter than a prayer	C
The voices of those hidden streams	S2
the Trent the Ouse and the Aire	C
	-
Streams that could never slake his thirst	T2
He heard them as he flowed	J2
But one dumb shadow haunted him along the	B2
Great North Road	J2
	-
Till now at dawn the towers of York rose on	U2
the reddening sky	J
And Bess went down between his knees	V2
like a breaking wave to die	J
	-
He lay beside her in the ditch he kissed her lovely head	D
And a shadow passed him like the wind and left him with his dead	D
	-
He saw but not that one as wakes the city that he sought	W2
He had escaped from London town but not from his own thought	W2
	-
He strode up to the Mickle gate with none to say him nay	F
And there he met his Other Self in the stranger light of day	F
	-
He strode up to the dreadful thing that in the gateway stood	X2
And it stretched out a ghostly hand that the dawn had stained with blood	Y2
	-
It stood as in the gates of hell with none to hear or see	X
Welcome it said Thou st ridden well and outstript all but me	X

Alfred Noyes

The Ballad Of Dick Turpin Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

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