A Swimmer's Dream Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BABACCCA BDBDEEED FGFGHHHG IAIACCIA BABAAABA BABABBBA JBBJB AKKAK JBLBLBLBL IMIMIMIM CNCNCNCN BBBBBBBB BCBCBIIIB BABAOOBA BPBPBBBP BBBBBBBB| Somno mollior unda | A |
| - | |
| I | - |
| Dawn is dim on the dark soft water | B |
| Soft and passionate dark and sweet | A |
| Love's own self was the deep sea's daughter | B |
| Fair and flawless from face to feet | A |
| Hailed of all when the world was golden | C |
| Loved of lovers whose names beholden | C |
| Thrill men's eyes as with light of olden | C |
| Days more glad than their flight was fleet | A |
| - | |
| So they sang but for men that love her | B |
| Souls that hear not her word in vain | D |
| Earth beside her and heaven above her | B |
| Seem but shadows that wax and wane | D |
| Softer than sleep's are the sea's caresses | E |
| Kinder than love's that betrays and blesses | E |
| Blither than spring's when her flowerful tresses | E |
| Shake forth sunlight and shine with rain | D |
| - | |
| All the strength of the waves that perish | F |
| Swells beneath me and laughs and sighs | G |
| Sighs for love of the life they cherish | F |
| Laughs to know that it lives and dies | G |
| Dies for joy of its life and lives | H |
| Thrilled with joy that its brief death gives | H |
| Death whose laugh or whose breath forgives | H |
| Change that bids it subside and rise | G |
| - | |
| II | - |
| Hard and heavy remote but nearing | I |
| Sunless hangs the severe sky's weight | A |
| Cloud on cloud though the wind be veering | I |
| Heaped on high to the sundawn's gate | A |
| Dawn and even and noon are one | C |
| Veiled with vapour and void of sun | C |
| Nought in sight or in fancied hearing | I |
| Now less mighty than time or fate | A |
| - | |
| The grey sky gleams and the grey seas glimmer | B |
| Pale and sweet as a dream's delight | A |
| As a dream's where darkness and light seem dimmer | B |
| Touched by dawn or subdued by night | A |
| The dark wind stern and sublime and sad | A |
| Swings the rollers to westward clad | A |
| With lustrous shadow that lures the swimmer | B |
| Lures and lulls him with dreams of light | A |
| - | |
| Light and sleep and delight and wonder | B |
| Change and rest and a charm of cloud | A |
| Fill the world of the skies whereunder | B |
| Heaves and quivers and pants aloud | A |
| All the world of the waters hoary | B |
| Now but clothed with its own live glory | B |
| That mates the lightning and mocks the thunder | B |
| With light more living and word more proud | A |
| - | |
| III | - |
| Far off westward whither sets the sounding strife | J |
| Strife more sweet than peace of shoreless waves whose glee | B |
| Scorns the shore and loves the wind that leaves them free | B |
| Strange as sleep and pale as death and fair as life | J |
| Shifts the moonlight coloured sunshine on the sea | B |
| - | |
| Toward the sunset's goal the sunless waters crowd | A |
| Fast as autumn days toward winter yet it seems | K |
| Here that autumn wanes not here that woods and streams | K |
| Lose not heart and change not likeness chilled and bowed | A |
| Warped and wrinkled here the days are fair as dreams | K |
| - | |
| IV | J |
| O russet robed November | B |
| What ails thee so to smile | L |
| Chill August pale September | B |
| Endured a woful while | L |
| And fell as falls an ember | B |
| From forth a flameless pile | L |
| But golden girt November | B |
| Bids all she looks on smile | L |
| - | |
| The lustrous foliage waning | I |
| As wanes the morning moon | M |
| Here falling here refraining | I |
| Outbraves the pride of June | M |
| With statelier semblance feigning | I |
| No fear lest death be soon | M |
| As though the woods thus waning | I |
| Should wax to meet the moon | M |
| - | |
| As though when fields lie stricken | C |
| By grey December's breath | N |
| These lordlier growths that sicken | C |
| And die for fear of death | N |
| Should feel the sense requicken | C |
| That hears what springtide saith | N |
| And thrills for love spring stricken | C |
| And pierced with April's breath | N |
| - | |
| The keen white winged north easter | B |
| That stings and spurs thy sea | B |
| Doth yet but feed and feast her | B |
| With glowing sense of glee | B |
| Calm chained her storm released her | B |
| And storm's glad voice was he | B |
| South wester or north easter | B |
| Thy winds rejoice the sea | B |
| - | |
| V | B |
| A dream a dream is it all the season | C |
| The sky the water the wind the shore | B |
| A day born dream of divine unreason | C |
| A marvel moulded of sleep no more | B |
| For the cloudlike wave that my limbs while cleaving | I |
| Feel as in slumber beneath them heaving | I |
| Soothes the sense as to slumber leaving | I |
| Sense of nought that was known of yore | B |
| - | |
| A purer passion a lordlier leisure | B |
| A peace more happy than lives on land | A |
| Fulfils with pulse of diviner pleasure | B |
| The dreaming head and the steering hand | A |
| I lean my cheek to the cold grey pillow | O |
| The deep soft swell of the full broad billow | O |
| And close mine eyes for delight past measure | B |
| And wish the wheel of the world would stand | A |
| - | |
| The wild winged hour that we fain would capture | B |
| Falls as from heaven that its light feet clomb | P |
| So brief so soft and so full the rapture | B |
| Was felt that soothed me with sense of home | P |
| To sleep to swim and to dream for ever | B |
| Such joy the vision of man saw never | B |
| For here too soon will a dark day sever | B |
| The sea bird's wing from the sea wave's foam | P |
| - | |
| A dream and more than a dream and dimmer | B |
| At once and brighter than dreams that flee | B |
| The moment's joy of the seaward swimmer | B |
| Abides remembered as truth may be | B |
| Not all the joy and not all the glory | B |
| Must fade as leaves when the woods wax hoary | B |
| For there the downs and the sea banks glimmer | B |
| And here to south of them swells the sea | B |
Algernon Charles Swinburne
(1)
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About A Swimmer's Dream
A Swimmer's Dream is a poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.
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