An Athenian Reverie Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNODPQRS TUVWXYDZA2ZB2SC2DD2E 2A2F2A2G2H2H2H2H2I2A 2H2J2H2H2A2IA2A2K2H2 A2H2AIL2M2 H2A2H2H2H2SA2N2O2CH2 H2A2H2A2H2IH2A2H2H2P 2Q2H2H2H2IA2A2K2H2A2 H2H2R2H2S2T2H2H2U2H2 H2A2V2H2H2K2IB2W2H2H 2H2X2I SH2H2A2H2U2H2A2A2IH2 H2Y2Z2H2SQA2T2K2K2B2 AA2T2Z2H2H2A3H2Z2B3A 2A2C3H2D3Z2Z2H2H2H2H 2E3A2Z2SF3W2G3 H2A2H2IT2Z2H3I3J3A2H 2SZ2A2A2SA2Z2SK3K2W2 Z2M2H2IIA2G3H2IH2H2Z 2A2Z2A2H2H2A2M2A2Z2A 2 SL3M3N3A2A2A2Z2O3A2Z 2H2N3H2H2H2A2IO3A2A2 A2K2H2H2L3K2Z2A2H2IH 2A2A2M2SA2N3B2IG3P3I H2A2A2A2P2Z2A2Q3R3A2 N3H2A2A2J3A2S3A2SZ2A 2A2H2H2T3A2H2SA2A2F2 A2A2SH2A2H2M2H2Z2OA2 Z2S3H2M2Z2H2Z2F2A2A2 M2F2G3S A2A2F2F2A2U3KF2N3H2H 2H2Z2H2H2H2Z2H2A2F2H 2F2F2V3A2Z2F2W3H2A2Z 2SH2A2A2IH2X3A2A2H2S A2C3A2A2Y3H2IA2H2A2S T3H2A2F2H2F2H2A2Z2F2 SA2H2A2SH2H2H2IH2KA2 SH2H2A2SSH2A2H2H2H2H 2SH2Z3H2S3 H2H2N3H2G3SH2IH2H2A2 H2Z2A2F2M2A2G3A4A2L2 A2D3A2SP3IA2H2How the returning days one after one | A |
Came ever in their rhythmic round unchanged | B |
Yet from each looped robe for every man | C |
Some new thing falls Happy is he | D |
Who fronts them without fear and like the gods | E |
Looks out unanxiously on each day's gift | F |
With calmly curious eye How many things | G |
Even in a little space both good and ill | H |
Have fallen on me and yet in all of them | I |
The keen experience or the smooth remembrance | J |
Hath found some sweet It scarcely seems a month | K |
Since we saw Crete so swiftly sped the days | L |
Borne onward with how many changing scenes | M |
Filled with how many crowding memories | N |
Not soon shall I forget them the stout ship | O |
All the tense labour with the windy sea | D |
The cloud wrapped heights of Crete beheld far off | P |
And white Cytaeon with its stormy pier | Q |
The fruitful valleys the wild mountain road | R |
And those long days of ever vigilant toil | S |
Scarcely with sleepless craft and unmoved front | T |
Escaping robbers that quiet restful eve | U |
At rich Gortyna where we lay and watched | V |
The dripping foliage and the darkening fields | W |
And over all huge browed above the night | X |
Ida's great summit with its fiery crown | Y |
And then once more the stormy treacherous sea | D |
The noisy ship the seamen's vehement cries | Z |
That battled with the whistling wind the feet | A2 |
Reeling upon the swaying deck and eyes | Z |
Strained anxiously toward land ah with what joy | B2 |
At last the busy pier at Nauplia | S |
Rest and firm shelter for our racking brains | C2 |
Most sweet of all most dear to memory | D |
That journey with Euktemon through the hills | D2 |
By fair Cleonae and the lofty pass | E2 |
Then Corinth with its riotous jollity | A2 |
Remembered like a reeling dream and here | F2 |
Good Theron's wedding and this festal day | A2 |
And I chief helper in its various rites | G2 |
Not least commissioned through these wakeful hours | H2 |
To dream before the quiet thalamos | H2 |
Unsleeping like some full grown bearded Eros | H2 |
The guardian of love's sweetest mysteries | H2 |
To morrow I shall hear again the din | I2 |
Of the loosed cables and the rowers' chaunt | A2 |
The rattled cordage and the plunging oars | H2 |
Once more the bending sail shall bear us on | J2 |
Across the level of the laughing sea | H2 |
Ere mid day we shall see far off behind us | H2 |
Faint as the summit of a sultry cloud | A2 |
The white Acropolis Past Sunium | I |
With rushing keel the long Euboean strand | A2 |
Hymettus and the pine dark hills shall fade | A2 |
Into the dusk at Andros we shall water | K2 |
And ere another starlight hush the shores | H2 |
From seaward valleys catch upon the wind | A2 |
The fragrance of old Chian vintages | H2 |
At Chios many things shall fall but none | A |
Can trace the future rather let me dream | I |
Of what is now and what hath been for both | L2 |
Are fraught with life | M2 |
- | |
Here the unbroken silence | H2 |
Awakens thought and makes remembrance sweet | A2 |
How solidly the brilliant moonlight shines | H2 |
Into the courts beneath the colonnades | H2 |
How dense the shadows I can scarcely see | H2 |
Yon painted Dian on the darkened wall | S |
Yet how the gloom hath made her real What sound | A2 |
Piercing the leafy covert of her couch | N2 |
Hath startled her Perchance some prowling wolf | O2 |
Or luckless footsteps of the stealthy Pan | C |
Creeping at night among noiseless steeps | H2 |
And hollows of the Erymanthian woods | H2 |
Roused her from sleep With listening head | A2 |
Snatched bow and quiver lightly slung she stands | H2 |
And peers across that dim and motionless glade | A2 |
Beckoning about her heels the wakeful dogs | H2 |
Yet Dian thus alert is but a dream | I |
Making more real this brooding quietness | H2 |
How strong and wonderful is night Mankind | A2 |
Has yielded all to one sweet helplessness | H2 |
Thought labour strife and all activities | H2 |
Have ebbed like fever The smooth tide of sleep | P2 |
Rolling across the fields of Attica | Q2 |
Hath covered all the labouring villages | H2 |
Even great Athens with her busy hands | H2 |
And busier tongues lies quiet beneath its waves | H2 |
Only a steady murmur seems to come | I |
Up from her silentness as if the land | A2 |
Were breathing heavily in dreams Abroad | A2 |
No creature stirs not even the reveller | K2 |
Staggering unlanterned from the cool Piraeus | H2 |
With drunken shout The remnants of the feast | A2 |
The crumpled cushions and the broken wreathes | H2 |
Lie scattered in yon shadowy court whose stones | H2 |
Through the warm hours drink up the staining wine | R2 |
The bridal oxen in their well filled stalls | H2 |
Sleep mindless of the happy weight they drew | S2 |
The torch is charred the garlands at the door | T2 |
So gay at morning with their bright festoons | H2 |
Hang limp and withered and the joyous flutes | H2 |
Are empty of all sound Only my brain | U2 |
Holds now in its remote unsleeping depths | H2 |
The echo of the tender hymenaeos | H2 |
And memory of the modest lips that sang it | A2 |
Within the silent thalamos the queen | V2 |
The sea sprung radiant Cytherean reigns | H2 |
And with her smiling lips and fathomless eyes | H2 |
Regards the lovers knowing that this hour | K2 |
Is theirs once only Earth and thought and time | I |
Lie far beyond them a great gulf of joy | B2 |
Absorbing fear regret and every grief | W2 |
A warm eternity or now perchance | H2 |
Night and the very weight of happiness | H2 |
Unsought have turned upon their tremulous eyes | H2 |
The mindless stream of sleep nor do they care | X2 |
If dawn should never come | I |
- | |
How joyously | S |
These hours have gone with all their pictured scenes | H2 |
A string of golden beads for memory | H2 |
To finger over in her moods or stay | A2 |
The hunger of some wakeful hour like this | H2 |
The flowers the myrtles the gay bridal train | U2 |
The flutes and pensive voices the white robes | H2 |
The shower of sweet meats and the jovial feast | A2 |
The bride cakes and the teeming merriment | A2 |
Most beautiful of all most sweet to name | I |
The good Lysippe with her down cast eyes | H2 |
Touched with soft fear half scared at all the noise | H2 |
Whose tears were ready as her laughter fresh | Y2 |
And modest as some pink anemone | Z2 |
How young she looked and how her smiling lips | H2 |
Betrayed her happiness Ah who can tell | S |
How often when no watchful eye was near | Q |
Her eager fingers trembling and ashamed | A2 |
Essayed the apple pips or strewed the floor | T2 |
With broken poppy petals Next to her | K2 |
Theron himself the gladest goodliest figure | K2 |
His honest face ruddy with health and joy | B2 |
And smiling like the AEgean when the sun | A |
Hangs high in heaven and the freshening wind | A2 |
Comes in from Melos rippling all its floor | T2 |
And there was Manto too the good old crone | Z2 |
So dear to children with her store of tales | H2 |
Warmed with new life how to her old grey face | H2 |
And withered limbs the very dance of youth | A3 |
Seemed to return and in her aged eyes | H2 |
The waning fire rekindled little Maeon | Z2 |
That mischievous satyr with his tipsy wreath | B3 |
Who kept us laughing at his pranks and made | A2 |
Old Phyrrho angry Him too sleep hath bound | A2 |
Upon his rough hewn couch with subtle thong | C3 |
Crowding his brain with odd fantastic shapes | H2 |
Even in sleep his little limbs I think | D3 |
Twitch restlessly and still his tongue gibes on | Z2 |
With inarticulate murmur Ah quaint Maeon | Z2 |
And Manto poor old Manto what dim dreams | H2 |
Of darkly moving chaos and slow shapes | H2 |
Of things that creep encumbered with huge burdens | H2 |
Gloom and infest her through these dragging hours | H2 |
Haunting the wavering soul so near the grave | E3 |
But all things journey to the same quiet end | A2 |
At last life joy and every form of motion | Z2 |
Nothing stands still Not least inevitable | S |
The sad recession of this passionate love | F3 |
Whose panting fires so soon and with such grief | W2 |
Burn down to ash | G3 |
- | |
Ai Ai 'tis a strange madness | H2 |
To give up thought ambition liberty | A2 |
And all the rooted custom of our days | H2 |
Even life itself for one all pampering dream | I |
That withers like those garlands at the door | T2 |
And yet I have seen many excellent men | Z2 |
Besotted thus and some that bore till death | H3 |
In the crook'd vision and embittered tongue | I3 |
The effect of this strange poison like a scar | J3 |
An ineradicable hurt but Fate | A2 |
Who deals more wondrously in this disease | H2 |
Even than in others yet doth sometimes will | S |
To make the same thing unto different men | Z2 |
Evil or good Was not Demetrios happy | A2 |
Who wore his fetters with such grace and spent | A2 |
On Chione the Naxian that shrewd girl | S |
His fortune and his youth yet while she lived | A2 |
Enjoyed the rich reward He seemed like one | Z2 |
That trod on wind and I remember well | S |
How when she died in that remorseless plague | K3 |
And I alone stood with him at the pyre | K2 |
He shook me with his helpless passionate grief | W2 |
And honest Agathon the married man | Z2 |
Whose boyish fondness for his pretty wife | M2 |
We smiled at and yet envied at the close | H2 |
Of each day's labour how he posted home | I |
And thence no bait however plumed could draw him | I |
We laughed but envied him How sweet she looked | A2 |
That morning at the Dyonisia | G3 |
With her rare eyes and modest girlish grace | H2 |
Leading her two small children by the palm | I |
I too might marry if the faithful gods | H2 |
Would promise me such joy as Agathon's | H2 |
Perhaps some day but no I am not one | Z2 |
To clip my wings and wind about my feet | A2 |
A net whose self made meshes are as stern | Z2 |
As they are soft To me is ever present | A2 |
The outer world with its untravelled paths | H2 |
The wanderer's dream the itch to see new things | H2 |
A single tie could never bind me fast | A2 |
For life this joyous busy ever changing life | M2 |
Is only dear to me with liberty | A2 |
With space of earth for feet to travel in | Z2 |
And space of mind for thought | A2 |
- | |
Not so for all | S |
To most men life is but a common thing | L3 |
The hours a sort of coin to barter with | M3 |
Whose worth is reckoned by the sum they buy | N3 |
In gold or power or pleasure each short day | A2 |
That brings not these deemed fruitless as dry sand | A2 |
Their lives are but a blind activity | A2 |
And death to them is but the end of motion | Z2 |
Grey children who have madly eat and drunk | O3 |
Won the high seats or filled their chests with gold | A2 |
And yet for all their years have never seen | Z2 |
The picture of their lives or how life looks | H2 |
To him who hath the deep uneager eye | N3 |
How sweet and large and beautiful it was | H2 |
How strange the part they played Like him who sits | H2 |
Beneath some mighty tree with half closed eyes | H2 |
At ease rejoicing in its murmurous shade | A2 |
Yet never once awakes from his dull dream | I |
To mark with curious joy the kingly trunk | O3 |
The sweeping boughs and tower of leaves that gave it | A2 |
Even so the most of men they take the gift | A2 |
And care not for the giver Strange indeed | A2 |
Are they and pitiable beyond measure | K2 |
Who thus unmindful of their wretchedness | H2 |
Crowd at life's bountiful gates like fattening beggars | H2 |
Greedy and blind For see how rich a thing | L3 |
Life is to him who sees to whom each hour | K2 |
Brings some fresh wonder to be brooded on | Z2 |
Adds some new group or studied history | A2 |
To that wrought sculpture that our watchful dreams | H2 |
Cast up upon the broad expanse of time | I |
As in a never finished frieze not less | H2 |
The little things that most men pass unmarked | A2 |
Than those that shake mankind Happy is he | A2 |
Who as a watcher stands apart from life | M2 |
From all life and his own and thus from all | S |
Each thought each deed and each hour's brief event | A2 |
Draws the full beauty sucks its meaning dry | N3 |
For him this life shall be a tranquil joy | B2 |
He shall be quiet and free To him shall come | I |
No gnawing hunger for the coarser touch | G3 |
No mad ambition with its fateful grasp | P3 |
Sorrow itself shall sway him like a dream | I |
- | |
How full life is how many memories | H2 |
Flash and shine out when thought is sharply stirred | A2 |
How the mind works when once the wheels are loosed | A2 |
How nimbly with what swift activity | A2 |
I think 'tis strange that men should ever sleep | P2 |
There are so many things to think upon | Z2 |
So many deeds so many thoughts to weigh | A2 |
To pierce and plumb them to the silent depth | Q3 |
Yet in that thought I do rebuke myself | R3 |
Too little given to probe the inner heart | A2 |
But rather wont with the luxurious eye | N3 |
To catch from life its outer loveliness | H2 |
Such things as do but store the joyous memory | A2 |
With food for solace rather than for thought | A2 |
Like light lined figures on a painted jar | J3 |
I wonder where Euktemon is to night | A2 |
Euktemon with his rough and fitful talk | S3 |
His moody gesture and defiant stride | A2 |
How strange how bleak and unapproachable | S |
And yet I liked him from the first How soon | Z2 |
We know our friends through all disguise of mood | A2 |
Discerning by a subtle touch of spirit | A2 |
The honest heart within Euktemon's glance | H2 |
Betrayed him with its gusty friendliness | H2 |
Flashing at moments from the clouded brow | T3 |
Like brave warm sunshine and his laughter too | A2 |
So rare so sudden so contagious | H2 |
How at some merry scene some well told tale | S |
Or swift invention of the winged wit | A2 |
It broke like thunderous water rolling out | A2 |
In shaken peals on the delighted ear | F2 |
Yet no man would have dreamed who saw us two | A2 |
That first grey morning on the pier at Crete | A2 |
That friendship could have forged thus easily | S |
A bond so subtle and so sure between us | H2 |
He gloomy and austere I full of thought | A2 |
As he yet in adverse mood at ease | H2 |
Lifting with lighter hands the lids of life | M2 |
Untortured by its riddles he whose smiles | H2 |
Were rare and sudden as the autumn sun | Z2 |
I to whom smiles are ever near the lip | O |
And yet I think he loved me too my mood | A2 |
Was not unpleasant to him though I know | Z2 |
At times I teased him with flickering talk | S3 |
How self immured he was for all our converse | H2 |
I gathered little little of his life | M2 |
A bitter trial to me who love to learn | Z2 |
The changes of men's outer circumstance | H2 |
The strokes that fate has shaped them with and so | Z2 |
Fitting to these their present speech and favour | F2 |
Discern the thought within From him I gleaned | A2 |
Nothing At least the word however guarded | A2 |
That sought to try the fastenings of his life | M2 |
With prying hands how mute and dark he grew | F2 |
And like the cautious tortoise at a touch | G3 |
Drew in beneath his shell | S |
- | |
But ah how sweet | A2 |
The memory of that long untroubled day | A2 |
To me so joyous and so free from care | F2 |
Spent as I love on foot our first together | F2 |
When fate and the reluctant sea at last | A2 |
Had given us safely to dry land the tramp | U3 |
From grey Mycenae by the pass to Corinth | K |
The smooth white road the soft caressing air | F2 |
Full of the scent of blossoms the clear sky | N3 |
Strewn lightly with the little tardy clouds | H2 |
Old Helios' scattered flock the low branched oaks | H2 |
And fountained resting places the cool nooks | H2 |
Where eyes less darkened with life's use than mine | Z2 |
Perchance had caught the Naiads in their dreams | H2 |
Or won white glimpses of their flying heels | H2 |
How light our feet were with what rhythmic strides | H2 |
We left the long blue gulf behind us sown | Z2 |
Far out with snowy sails and how our hearts | H2 |
Rose with the growth of morning till we reached | A2 |
That moss hung fountain on the hillside near | F2 |
Cleonae where the dark anemones | H2 |
Cover the ground and make it red like fire | F2 |
Could ever grief I wonder or fixed care | F2 |
Or even the lingering twilight of old age | V3 |
Divest for me such memories of their sweet | A2 |
Even Euktemon's obdurate mood broke down | Z2 |
The odorous stillness the serene bright air | F2 |
The leafy shadows the warm blossoming earth | W3 |
Drew near with their voluptuous eloquence | H2 |
And melted him Ah what a talk we had | A2 |
How eagerly our nimble tongues ran on | Z2 |
With linked wit in joyous sympathy | S |
Such hours I think are better than long years | H2 |
Of brooding loneliness mind touching mind | A2 |
To leaping life and thought sustaining thought | A2 |
Till even the darkest chambers of grey time | I |
His ancient seats and bolted mysteries | H2 |
Open their hoary doors and at a look | X3 |
Lay all their treasures bare How when our thought | A2 |
Wheeling on ever bolder wings at last | A2 |
Grew as it seemed too large for utterance | H2 |
We both fell silent striving to recall | S |
And grasp such things as in our daring mood | A2 |
We had but glimpsed and leaped at yet how long | C3 |
We studied thus with absent eyes I know not | A2 |
Our thought died slowly out the busy road | A2 |
The voices of the passers by the change | Y3 |
Of garb and feature and the various tongues | H2 |
Absorbed us Ah how clearly I recall them | I |
For in these silent wakeful hours the mind | A2 |
Is strangely swift With that sharp lines | H2 |
The shapes of things that even years have buried | A2 |
Shine out upon the rapid memory | S |
Moving and warm like life I can see now | T3 |
The form of that tall peddler whose strange wares | H2 |
Outlandish dialect and impudent gait | A2 |
Awoke Euktemon's laughter In mine ear | F2 |
Is echoing still the cracking string of gibes | H2 |
They flung at one another I remember too | F2 |
The grey haired merchant with his bold black eyes | H2 |
And brace of slaves the old ship captain tanned | A2 |
With sweeping sea winds and the pitiless sun | Z2 |
But best of all that dainty amorous pair | F2 |
Whose youthful spirit neither heat nor toil | S |
Could conquer What a charming group they made | A2 |
The creaking litter and the long brown poles | H2 |
The sinewy bearers with their cat like stride | A2 |
Dripping with sweat that merry dark eyed girl | S |
Whose sudden beauty shook us from our dreams | H2 |
And chained our eyes How beautiful she was | H2 |
Half hid among the gay Miletian cushions | H2 |
The lovely laughing face the gracious form | I |
The fragrant lightly knotted hair and eyes | H2 |
Full of the dancing fire of wanton Corinth | K |
That happy stripling whose delighted feet | A2 |
Swung at her side whose tongue ran on so gaily | S |
Is it for him alone she wreathes those smiles | H2 |
And tunes so musically that flexile voice | H2 |
Soft as the Lydian flute Surely his gait | A2 |
Proclaimed the lover and his well filled girdle | S |
Not less the lover's strength How joyously | S |
He strode unmindful of his ruffled curls | H2 |
Whose perfumes still went wide upon the wind | A2 |
His dust stained robe unheeded and the stones | H2 |
Whose ragged edges frayed his delicate shoes | H2 |
How radiant how full of hope he was | H2 |
What pleasant memories how many things | H2 |
Rose up again before me as I lay | S |
Half stretched among the crushed anemones | H2 |
And watched them till a far off jutting ledge | Z3 |
Precluded sight still listening till mine ears | H2 |
Caught the last vanishing murmur of their talk | S3 |
- | |
Only a little longer then we rose | H2 |
With limbs refreshed and kept a swinging pace | H2 |
Toward Corinth but our talk I know not why | N3 |
Fell for that day I wonder what there was | H2 |
About those dainty lovers or their speech | G3 |
That changed Euktemon's mood for all the way | S |
From high Cleonae to the city gates | H2 |
Till sunset found us loitering without aim | I |
Half lost among the dusky moving crowds | H2 |
I could get nothing from him but dark looks | H2 |
Short answers and the old defiant stride | A2 |
Some memory pricked him It may be perchance | H2 |
A woman's treachery some luckless passion | Z2 |
In former days endured hath seared his blood | A2 |
And dowered him with that cureless bitter humour | F2 |
To him solitude and the wanderer's life | M2 |
Alone are sweet the tumults of this world | A2 |
A thing unworthy of the wise man's touch | G3 |
Its joys and sorrows to be met alike | A4 |
With broad browed scorn One quality at least | A2 |
We have in common we are idlers both | L2 |
Shifters and wanderers through this sleepless world | A2 |
Albeit in different moods 'Tis that I think | D3 |
That knit us and the universal need | A2 |
For near companionship Howe'er it be | S |
There is no hand that I would gladlier grasp | P3 |
Either on earth or in the nether gloom | I |
When the grey keel shall grind the Stygian strand | A2 |
Than stern Euktemon's | H2 |
Archibald Lampman
(1)
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