The Royal Jester Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBCCDDEEFFAAGGHHII JK LLMMNNDDOOPPAAQQ RRSSTUVVOOWWXXVV YYZZA2A2 B2B2WWC2C2OOA2A2D2D2 E2E2F2F2TTG2G2H2H2I2 I2J2J2K2K2L2L2M2M2 L2L2N2M| Once on a time so ancient poets sing | A |
| There reigned in Godknowswhere a certain king | A |
| So great a monarch ne'er before was seen | B |
| He was a hero even to his queen | B |
| In whose respect he held so high a place | C |
| That none was higher nay not even the ace | C |
| He was so just his Parliament declared | D |
| Those subjects happy whom his laws had spared | D |
| So wise that none of the debating throng | E |
| Had ever lived to prove him in the wrong | E |
| So good that Crime his anger never feared | F |
| And Beauty boldly plucked him by the beard | F |
| So brave that if his army got a beating | A |
| None dared to face him when he was retreating | A |
| This monarch kept a Fool to make his mirth | G |
| And loved him tenderly despite his worth | G |
| Prompted by what caprice I cannot say | H |
| He called the Fool before the throne one day | H |
| And to that jester seriously said | I |
| 'I'll abdicate and you shall reign instead | I |
| While I attired in motley will make sport | J |
| To entertain your Majesty and Court ' | K |
| - | |
| 'T was done and the Fool governed He decreed | L |
| The time of harvest and the time of seed | L |
| Ordered the rains and made the weather clear | M |
| And had a famine every second year | M |
| Altered the calendar to suit his freak | N |
| Ordaining six whole holidays a week | N |
| Religious creeds and sacred books prepared | D |
| Made war when angry and made peace when scared | D |
| New taxes he inspired new laws he made | O |
| Drowned those who broke them who observed them flayed | O |
| In short he ruled so well that all who'd not | P |
| Been starved decapitated hanged or shot | P |
| Made the whole country with his praises ring | A |
| Declaring he was every inch a king | A |
| And the High Priest averred 't was very odd | Q |
| If one so competent were not a god | Q |
| - | |
| Meantime his master now in motley clad | R |
| Wore such a visage woeful wan and sad | R |
| That some condoled with him as with a brother | S |
| Who having lost a wife had got another | S |
| Others mistaking his profession often | T |
| Approached him to be measured for a coffin | U |
| For years this highborn jester never broke | V |
| The silence he was pondering a joke | V |
| At last one day in cap and bells arrayed | O |
| He strode into the Council and displayed | O |
| A long bright smile that glittered in the gloom | W |
| Like a gilt epithet within a tomb | W |
| Posing his bauble like a leader's staff | X |
| To give the signal when and why to laugh | X |
| He brought it down with peremptory stroke | V |
| And simultaneously cracked his joke | V |
| - | |
| I can't repeat it friends I ne'er could school | Y |
| Myself to quote from any other fool | Y |
| A jest if it were worse than mine would start | Z |
| My tears if better it would break my heart | Z |
| So if you please I'll hold you but to state | A2 |
| That royal Jester's melancholy fate | A2 |
| - | |
| The insulted nation so the story goes | B2 |
| Rose as one man the very dead arose | B2 |
| Springing indignant from the riven tomb | W |
| And babes unborn leapt swearing from the womb | W |
| All to the Council Chamber clamoring went | C2 |
| By rage distracted and on vengeance bent | C2 |
| In that vast hall in due disorder laid | O |
| The tools of legislation were displayed | O |
| And the wild populace its wrath to sate | A2 |
| Seized them and heaved them at the Jester's pate | A2 |
| Mountains of writing paper pools and seas | D2 |
| Of ink awaiting to become decrees | D2 |
| Royal approval and the same in stacks | E2 |
| Lay ready for attachment backed with wax | E2 |
| Pens to make laws erasers to amend them | F2 |
| With mucilage convenient to extend them | F2 |
| Scissors for limiting their application | T |
| And acids to repeal all legislation | T |
| These flung as missiles till the air was dense | G2 |
| Were most offensive weapons of offense | G2 |
| And by their aid the Fool was nigh destroyed | H2 |
| They ne'er had been so harmlessly employed | H2 |
| Whelmed underneath a load of legal cap | I2 |
| His mouth egurgitating ink on tap | I2 |
| His eyelids mucilaginously sealed | J2 |
| His fertile head by scissors made to yield | J2 |
| Abundant harvestage of ears his pelt | K2 |
| In every wrinkle and on every welt | K2 |
| Quickset with pencil points from feet to gills | L2 |
| And thickly studded with a pride of quills | L2 |
| The royal Jester in the dreadful strife | M2 |
| Was made in short an editor for life | M2 |
| - | |
| An idle tale and yet a moral lurks | L2 |
| In this as plainly as in greater works | L2 |
| I shall not give it birth one moral here | N2 |
| Would die of loneliness within a year | M |
Ambrose Bierce
(1)
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About The Royal Jester
The Royal Jester is a poem by Ambrose Bierce. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.
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