To Her Most Honoured Father Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBCCDDEEFFGBGG HIJJGGBBKKLLGGJGGGMM NNJJII BB O| Dear Sir of late delighted with the sight | A |
| Of your four Sisters cloth'd in black and white | A |
| Of fairer Dames the Sun ne'r saw the face | B |
| Though made a pedestal for Adams Race | B |
| Their worth so shines in those rich lines you show | C |
| Their paralels to finde I scarely know | C |
| To climbe their Climes I have nor strength nor skill | D |
| To mount so high requires an Eagle's quill | D |
| Yet view thereof did cause my thoughts to soar | E |
| My lowly pen might wait upon those four | E |
| I bring my four times four now meanly clad | F |
| To do their homage unto yours full glad | F |
| Who for their Age their worth and quality | G |
| Might seem of yours to claim precedency | B |
| But by my humble hand thus rudely pen'd | G |
| They are your bounden handmaids to attend | G |
| - | |
| These same are they from whom we being have | H |
| These are of all the Life the Nurse the Grave | I |
| These are the hot the cold the moist the dry | J |
| That sink that swim that fill that upwards fly | J |
| Of these consists our bodies Cloathes and Food | G |
| The World the useful hurtful and the good | G |
| Sweet harmony they keep yet jar oft times | B |
| Their discord doth appear by these harsh rimes | B |
| Yours did contest for wealth for Arts for Age | K |
| My first do shew their good and then their rage | K |
| My other foures do intermixed tell | L |
| Each others faults and where themselves excell | L |
| How hot and dry contend with moist and cold | G |
| How Air and Earth no correspondence hold | G |
| And yet in equal tempers how they 'gree | J |
| How divers natures make one Unity | G |
| Something of all though mean I did intend | G |
| But fear'd you'ld judge Du Bartas was my friend | G |
| I honour him but dare not wear his wealth | M |
| My goods are true though poor I love no stealth | M |
| But if I did I durst not send them you | N |
| Who must reward a Thief but with his due | N |
| I shall not need mine innocence to clear | J |
| These ragged lines will do 't when they appear | J |
| On what they are your mild aspect I crave | I |
| Accept my best my worst vouchsafe a Grave | I |
| - | |
| From her that to your self more duty owes | B |
| Then water in the boundess Ocean flows | B |
| - | |
| March | O |
Anne Bradstreet
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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