A Vision Of Doom Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPLQRS TUVWXTYZA2B2C2D2E2F2 G2H2ZI2J2K2L2G2LM2M2 N2O2P2Q2R2ATIIS2T2U2 V2W2TX2Y2Z2A3B3JC3CD 3E3F3G2GZ2 ABCDEFGHIJG3H3I3

I stood upon a hill The setting sunA
Was crimson with a curse and a portentB
And scarce his angry ray lit up the landC
That lay below whose lurid gloom appearedD
Freaked with a moving mist which reeking upE
From dim tarns hateful with some horrid banF
Took shapes forbidden and without a nameG
Gigantic night birds rising from the reedsH
With cries discordant startled all the airI
And bodiless voices babbled in the gloomJ
The ghosts of blasphemies long ages stilledK
And shrieks of women and men's curses AllL
These visible shapes and sounds no mortal earM
Had ever heard some spiritual senseN
Interpreted though brokenly for IO
Was haunted by a consciousness of crimeP
Some giant guilt but whose I knew not AllL
These things malign by sight and sound revealedQ
Were sin begotten that I knew no moreR
And that but dimly as in dreadful dreamsS
The sleepy senses babble to the brainT
Imperfect witness As I stood a voiceU
But whence it came I knew not cried aloudV
Some words to me in a forgotten tongueW
Yet straight I knew me for a ghost forlornX
Returned from the illimited inaneT
Again but in a language that I knewY
As in reply to something which in meZ
Had shaped itself a thought but found no wordsA2
It spake from the dread mystery aboutB2
'Immortal shadow of a mortal soulC2
That perished with eternity attendD2
What thou beholdest is as void as thouE2
The shadow of a poet's dream himselfF2
As thou his soul as thine long deadG2
But not like thine outlasted by its shadeH2
His dreams alone survive eternityZ
As pictures in the unsubstantial voidI2
Excepting thee and me and we becauseJ2
The poet wove us in his thought remainsK2
Of nature and the universe no partL2
Or vestige but the poet's dreams This dreadG2
Unspeakable land about thy feet with allL
Its desolation and its terrors loM2
'T is but a phantom world So long agoM2
That God and all the angels since have diedN2
That poet lived yourself long dead his mindO2
Filled with the light of a prophetic fireP2
And standing by the Western sea aboveQ2
The youngest fairest city in the worldR2
Named in another tongue than his for oneA
Ensainted saw its populous domainT
Plague smitten with a nameless shame For thereI
Red handed murder rioted and thereI
The people gathered gold nor cared to looseS2
The assassin's fingers from the victim's throatT2
But said each in his vile pursuit engrossedU2
'Am I my brother's keeper Let the LawV2
Look to the matter ' But the Law did notW2
And there O pitiful the babe was slainT
Within its mother's breast and the same graveX2
Held babe and mother and the people smiledY2
Still gathering gold and said 'The Law the Law 'Z2
Then the great poet touched upon the lipsA3
With a live coal from Truth's high altar raisedB3
His arms to heaven and sang a song of doomJ
Sang of the time to be when God should leanC3
Indignant from the Throne and lift his handC
And that foul city be no more a taleD3
A dream a desolation and a curseE3
No vestige of its glory should surviveF3
In fact or memory its people deadG2
Its site forgotten and its very nameG
Disputed 'Z2
-
'Was the prophecy fulfilled '-
The sullen disc of the declining sunA
Was crimson with a curse and a portentB
And scarce his angry ray lit up the landC
That lay below whose lurid gloom appearedD
Freaked with a moving mist which reeking upE
From dim tarns hateful with a horrid banF
Took shapes forbidden and without a nameG
Gigantic night birds rising from the reedsH
With cries discordant startled all the airI
And bodiless voices babbled in the gloomJ
But not to me came any voice againG3
And covering my face with thin dead handsH3
I wept and woke and cried aloud to GodI3

Ambrose Bierce



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