The White Cliffs Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCBCDEDEDFDF ADDGGHHIIJJKKLMNNOOP PQQJJBBB ADDRRSSTTUUVVWWUU TTDDXXBBYYYP PBBZZB GGA2A2QB2C2C2D2D2 D2E2F2E2F2DQDQG2H2G2 H2 D2DI2DI2WJ2WJ2DK2DK2 D2L2D2L2 D2J2M2J2M2NJ2NJ2J2DJ 2D D2D2N2DN2O2FDFP2J2D2 J2D2P2Q2P2 D2J2D2J2D2J2J2DJ2DJ2 R2R2 WS2WS2T2T2 J2U2U2J2V2J2V2J2J2 J2J2P2P2 P2P2P2P2W2W2P2 D2D2P2P2 J2J2 J2X2WNWJ2WD2DP2DWD G2P2D2P2P2P2 D2Q2I | A |
I have loved England dearly and deeply | B |
Since that first morning shining and pure | C |
The white cliffs of Dover I saw rising steeply | B |
Out of the sea that once made her secure | C |
I had no thought then of husband or lover | D |
I was a traveller the guest of a week | E |
Yet when they pointed 'the white cliffs of Dover' | D |
Startled I found there were tears on my cheek | E |
I have loved England and still as a stranger | D |
Here is my home and I still am alone | F |
Now in her hour of trial and danger | D |
Only the English are really her own | F |
- | |
II | A |
It happened the first evening I was there | D |
Some one was giving a ball in Belgrave Square | D |
At Belgrave Square that most Victorian spot | G |
Lives there a novel reader who has not | G |
At some time wept for those delightful girls | H |
Daughters of dukes prime ministers and earls | H |
In bonnets berthas bustles buttoned basques | I |
Hiding behind their pure Victorian masks | I |
Hearts just as hot hotter perhaps than those | J |
Whose owners now abandon hats and hose | J |
Who has not wept for Lady Joan or Jill | K |
Loving against her noble parent's will | K |
A handsome guardsman who to her alarm | L |
Feels her hand kissed behind a potted palm | M |
At Lady Ivry's ball the dreadful night | N |
Before his regiment goes off to fight | N |
And see him the next morning in the park | O |
Complete in busbee marching to embark | O |
I had read freely even as a child | P |
Not only Meredith and Oscar Wilde | P |
But many novels of an earlier day | Q |
Ravenshoe Can You Forgive Her Vivien Grey | Q |
Ouida The Duchess Broughton's Red As a Rose | J |
Guy Livingstone Whyte Melville Heaven knows | J |
What others Now I thought I was to see | B |
Their habitat though like the Miller of Dee | B |
I cared for none and no one cared for me | B |
- | |
- | |
III | A |
A light blue carpet on the stair | D |
And tall young footmen everywhere | D |
Tall young men with English faces | R |
Standing rigidly in their places | R |
Rows and rows of them stiff and staid | S |
In powder and breeches and bright gold braid | S |
And high above them on the wall | T |
Hung other English faces all | T |
Part of the pattern of English life | U |
General Sir Charles and his pretty wife | U |
Admirals Lords Lieutenant of Shires | V |
Men who were served by these footmen's sires | V |
At their great parties none of them knowing | W |
How soon or late they would all be going | W |
In plainer dress to a sterner strife | U |
Another pattern of English life | U |
- | |
I went up the stairs between them all | T |
Strange and frightened and shy and small | T |
And as I entered the ballroom door | D |
Saw something I had never seen before | D |
Except in portraits a stout old guest | X |
With a broad blue ribbon across his breast | X |
That blue as deep as the southern sea | B |
Bluer than skies can ever be | B |
The Countess of Salisbury Edward the Third | Y |
No damn merit the Duke I heard | Y |
My own voice saying 'Upon my word | Y |
The garter ' and clapped my hands like a child | P |
- | |
Some one beside me turned and smiled | P |
And looking down at me said 'I fancy | B |
You're Bertie's Australian cousin Nancy | B |
He toId me to tell you that he'd be late | Z |
At the Foreign Office and not to wait | Z |
Supper for him but to go with me | B |
And try to behave as if I were he ' | - |
I should have told him on the spot | G |
That I had no cousin that I was not | G |
Australian Nancy that my name | A2 |
Was Susan Dunne and that I came | A2 |
From a small white town on a deep cut bay | Q |
In the smallest state in the U S A | B2 |
I meant to tell him but changed my mind | C2 |
I needed a friend and he seemed kind | C2 |
So I put my gloved hand into his glove | D2 |
And we danced together and fell in love | D2 |
- | |
IV | D2 |
Young and in love how magical the phrase | E2 |
How magical the fact Who has not yearned | F2 |
Over young lovers when to their amaze | E2 |
They fall in love and find their love returned | F2 |
And the lights brighten and their eyes are clear | D |
To see God's image in their common clay | Q |
Is it the music of the spheres they hear | D |
Is it the prelude to that noble play | Q |
The drama of Joined Lives Ah they forget | G2 |
They cannot write their parts the bell has rung | H2 |
The curtain rises and the stage is set | G2 |
For tragedy they were in love and young | H2 |
- | |
V | D2 |
We went to the Tower | D |
We went to the Zoo | I2 |
We saw every flower | D |
In the gardens at Kew | I2 |
We saw King Charles a prancing | W |
On his long tailed horse | J2 |
And thought him more entrancing | W |
Than better kings of course | J2 |
At a strange early hour | D |
In St James's palace yard | K2 |
We watched in a shower | D |
The changing of the guard | K2 |
And I said what a pity | D2 |
To have just a week to spend | L2 |
When London is a city | D2 |
Whose beauties never end | L2 |
- | |
VI | D2 |
When the sun shines on England it atones | J2 |
For low hung leaden skies and rain and dim | M2 |
Moist fogs that paint the verdure on her stones | J2 |
And fill her gentle rivers to the brim | M2 |
When the sun shines on England shafts of light | N |
Fall on far towers and hills and dark old trees | J2 |
And hedge bound meadows of a green as bright | N |
As bright as is the blue of tropic seas | J2 |
When the sun shines it is as if the face | J2 |
Of some proud man relaxed his haughty stare | D |
And smiled upon us with a sudden grace | J2 |
Flattering because its coming is so rare | D |
- | |
VII | D2 |
The English are frosty | D2 |
When you're no kith or kin | N2 |
Of theirs but how they alter | D |
When once they take you in | N2 |
The kindest the truest | O2 |
The best friends ever known | F |
It's hard to remember | D |
How they froze you to a bone | F |
They showed me all London | P2 |
Johnnie and his friends | J2 |
They took me to the country | D2 |
For long week ends | J2 |
I never was so happy | D2 |
I never had such fun | P2 |
I stayed many weeks in England | Q2 |
Instead of just one | P2 |
- | |
VIII | D2 |
John had one of those English faces | J2 |
That always were and will always be | D2 |
Found in the cream of English places | J2 |
Till England herself sink into the sea | D2 |
A blond bowed face with prominent eyes | J2 |
A little bit bluer than English skies | J2 |
You see it in ruffs and suits of armour | D |
You see it in wigs of many styles | J2 |
Soldier and sailor judge and farmer | D |
That face has governed the British Isles | J2 |
By the power for good or ill bestowed | R2 |
Only on those who live by code | R2 |
- | |
Oh that inflexible code of living | W |
That seems so easy and unconstrained | S2 |
The Englishman's code of taking and giving | W |
Rights and privileges pre ordained | S2 |
Based since English life began | T2 |
On the prime importance of being a man | T2 |
- | |
IX | J2 |
And what a voice he had gentle profound | U2 |
Clear masculine I melted at the sound | U2 |
Oh English voices are there any words | J2 |
Those tones to tell those cadences to teach | V2 |
As song of thrushes is to other birds | J2 |
So English voices are to other speech | V2 |
Those pure round 'o's ' those lovely liquid 'l's' | J2 |
Ring in the ears like sound of Sabbath bells | J2 |
- | |
Yet I have loathed those voices when the sense | J2 |
Of what they said seemed to me insolence | J2 |
As if the dominance of the whole nation | P2 |
Lay in that clear correct enunciation | P2 |
- | |
Many years later I remember when | P2 |
One evening I overheard two men | P2 |
In Claridge's white waistcoats coats I know | P2 |
Were built in Bond Street or in Savile Row | P2 |
So calm so confident so finely bred | W2 |
Young gods in tails and this is what they said | W2 |
'Not your first visit to the States ' 'Oh no | P2 |
I'd been to Canada two years ago ' | - |
Good God I thought have they not heard that we | D2 |
Were those queer colonists who would be free | D2 |
Who took our desperate chance and fought and won | P2 |
Under a colonist called Washington | P2 |
- | |
One does not lose one's birthright it appears | J2 |
I had been English then for many years | J2 |
- | |
X | J2 |
We went down to Cambridge | X2 |
Cambridge in the spring | W |
In a brick court at twilight | N |
We heard the thrushes sing | W |
And we went to evening service | J2 |
In the chapel of the King | W |
The library of Trinity | D2 |
The quadrangle of Clare | D |
John bought a pipe from Bacon | P2 |
And I acquired there | D |
The Anecdotes of Painting | W |
From a handcart in the square | D |
- | |
The Playing fields at sunset | G2 |
Were vivid emerald green | P2 |
The elms were tall and mighty | D2 |
And many youths were seen | P2 |
Carefree young gentlemen | P2 |
In the Spring of 'Fourteen | P2 |
- | |
XI | D2 |
London just before dawn immense and | Q2 |
Alice Duer Miller
(1)
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