An Inventor Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BCDEF GHIJKLMGN OPQRSETUVWXRYRZA2 RB2C2D2HRERE2F2RR G2H2REE2I2 RWEVJ2K2RL2FA2L2M2CR RRRRRN2O2RP2Q2CRR2S2 N2ERET2U2ZV2W2X2RRRS Y2VW2D2VE2Z2FRE2VEA3 B3C3D3E3RL2VRCRF3RRB 2G3H3RCSEX2I3E VJ3K3L3M3L3WL2EB2WN3 O3RB3E2P3 RP3ROP3EP3X2ERQ3 P3RH3RR3KZS3T3P3P3P3 U3RR3P3X2RRRV3REP3EW 3| Not yet | A |
| - | |
| I thought this time 'twas done at last | B |
| the workings perfected the life in it | C |
| and there's the flaw again the petty flaw | D |
| the fretting small impossibility | E |
| that has to be made possible | F |
| - | |
| To work | G |
| so many more months lost on a wrong tack | H |
| and months and months may so be lost again | I |
| who knows until they swell a tale of years | J |
| counted by failures No time to sit down | K |
| with folded arms to moan for the spent toil | L |
| for on on glide the envious treacherous hours | M |
| that bring at last the night when none can work | G |
| and I'll not die with my work unfulfilled | N |
| - | |
| It must perform my thought it must awake | O |
| this soulless whirring thing of springs and wheels | P |
| and be a power among us Aye but how | Q |
| There it stands facing me compact precise | R |
| the nice presentment of my long design | S |
| and what is it an accurate mockery | E |
| and not my creature Where's my secret hid | T |
| the little easy secret which once found | U |
| will shew so palpable that the pleased world | V |
| shall presently believe it always knew | W |
| Where is my secret Oh my aching brain | X |
| Good God have all the anxious ponderings | R |
| all the laborious strain of hand and head | Y |
| all the night watches all the stolen days | R |
| from fruitfuller tasks all I have borne and done | Z |
| brought me no nearer solving | A2 |
| - | |
| Stolen days | R |
| yes from the little ones and grave pale wife | B2 |
| who should have every hour of mine made coin | C2 |
| to buy them sunshine Stolen and they lack all | D2 |
| save the bare needs which only paupers lack | H |
| stolen and cheerlessly the mother sits | R |
| over her dismal blinding stitchery | E |
| and no quick smile of welcome parts her lips | R |
| seeing me come and quiet at their play | E2 |
| the children crowd cooped in the unlovely home | F2 |
| and envy tattered urchins out of doors | R |
| their merry life and playground of the streets | R |
| - | |
| Oh if it were but my one self to spend | G2 |
| but to doom them too with me Never a thought | H2 |
| dawns first into the world but is a curse | R |
| on the rash finder part of heaven's fire | E |
| filched to bestow on men and for your pay | E2 |
| the vulture at your heart | I2 |
| - | |
| What should one choose | R |
| or is there choice A madness comes on you | W |
| whose name is revelation who has power | E |
| to check the passion of it who in the world | V |
| A revelation yes 'tis but a name | J2 |
| for knowledge and there perishes free will | K2 |
| for every man is slave of what he knows | R |
| it is the soul of him could you quench that | L2 |
| you leave the mere mechanic animal | F |
| a sentient creature true and reasoning | A2 |
| because the clockwork in it's made for that | L2 |
| but like my creature there its purport lacked | M2 |
| so but its own abortive counterfeit | C |
| We have our several purports some to pace | R |
| the accustomed roads and foot down rampant weeds | R |
| bearing mute custom smoothly on her course | R |
| some difficultly to force readier paths | R |
| or hew out passes through the wilderness | R |
| and some belike to find the snuggest place | R |
| and purr beside the fire Each of his kind | N2 |
| but can you change your kind the lion caged | O2 |
| is still a lion pipes us no lark's trills | R |
| drive forth the useful brood hen from the yard | P2 |
| she'll never learn the falcon's soar and swoop | Q2 |
| We must abye our natures if they fit | C |
| too crossly to our hap the worse for us | R |
| but who would pray say such a prayer could serve | R2 |
| Let me become some other not myself | S2 |
| - | |
| And yet and yet Oh why am I assigned | N2 |
| to this long maiming battle Why to me | E |
| this blasting gift this lightning of the gods | R |
| scorching the hand that wields it why to me | E |
| A lonely man or dandled in the lap | T2 |
| of comfortable fortune might with joy | U2 |
| hug the strange serpent blessing to the one | Z |
| it has no tooth for gilded hands make gold | V2 |
| of all they touch the other is alone | W2 |
| and has the right to suffer Not for them | X2 |
| is doubt or dread but I Oh little ones | R |
| whose unsuspecting eyes pierce me with smiles | R |
| Oh sad and brooding wife whose silent hopes | R |
| are all rebukes to mine | S |
| - | |
| Come think it out | Y2 |
| traitor to them or traitor to the world | V |
| is that the choice Why then they are my own | W2 |
| given in my hand looking to me for all | D2 |
| and for my destined present to the world | V |
| being what it is some one some fortunate day | E2 |
| will find it or achieve it if the world wait | Z2 |
| well it has waited Yet 'twere pitiful | F |
| that still and still while to a thousand souls | R |
| life's irrecoverable swift to day | E2 |
| becomes the futile yesterday the world | V |
| go beggared of a birthright unaware | E |
| and as if one should slake his thirst with blood | A3 |
| pricked from his own red veins while at his hand | B3 |
| lies the huge hairy nut from whose rough bowl | C3 |
| he might quaff juicy milk and knows it not | D3 |
| spend out so great a wealth of wasted strength | E3 |
| man upon man given to the imperious | R |
| unnecessary labour How were that | L2 |
| having made my honest bargain with the world | V |
| to serve its easier and accepted needs | R |
| for the due praise and pudding keeping it | C |
| like a wise servant not to lose my place | R |
| to note the enduring loss and adding up | F3 |
| its various mischiefs score them as the price | R |
| of my reposeful fortunes Why do this | R |
| and each starved blockhead dribbling out his life | B2 |
| on the continued toil would be my drudge | G3 |
| and not one farthest comer of our earth | H3 |
| where hurrying traffic plies but would have voice | R |
| to reach my ears and twit me guilty to it | C |
| But then the wife and children must they pine | S |
| in the bleak shade of frosty poverty | E |
| because the man that should have cared for them | X2 |
| discerned a way to double wealth with wealth | I3 |
| and glut the maw of rank prosperity | E |
| - | |
| Traitor to them or traitor to the world | V |
| a downright question that and sounds well put | J3 |
| and one that begs its answer since we count | K3 |
| the nearer duty first to every man | L3 |
| but there's another pungent clause to note | M3 |
| that's traitor to myself Has any man | L3 |
| the right of that God puts a gift in you | W |
| to your own hurt we'll say but what of that | L2 |
| He puts a gift in you a seed to grow | E |
| to His fulfilment germinant with your life | B2 |
| and may you crush it out And say you do | W |
| what is your remnant life an empty husk | N3 |
| or balked and blighted stem past hope of bloom | O3 |
| Well make the seed develope otherwise | R |
| and grow to your fulfilment wiselier planned | B3 |
| but will that prosper may the thistle say | E2 |
| Let me blow smooth white lilies or the wheat | P3 |
| - | |
| Let me be purple with enticing grapes | R |
| God says Be that I bade or else be nought | P3 |
| and what thing were the man to make that choice | R |
| For me I dare not were it for their sake | O |
| and for their sake I dare not could their good | P3 |
| grow out of my undoing they with me | E |
| and I with them we are so interknit | P3 |
| that taint in me must canker into them | X2 |
| and my upholding holds them from the mire | E |
| and so as there are higher things than ease | R |
| we must bear on together they and I | Q3 |
| - | |
| And it may be to bear is all our part | P3 |
| I have outpast the first fantastic hopes | R |
| that fluttered round my project at its birth | H3 |
| outgrown them as the learning child outgrows | R |
| the picture A's and B's that lured him on | R3 |
| I have forgotten honours wealth renown | K |
| I see no bribe before me but that one | Z |
| my work's fruition Yes as we all who feel | S3 |
| the dawn of a creative thought discern | T3 |
| in the beginning that perfected end | P3 |
| which haply shall not be I saw the end | P3 |
| and my untried presumptuous eyes befooled | P3 |
| saw it at hand How round each forward step | U3 |
| locked the delusive and decoying dreams | R |
| and I seemed while I sowed still hurrying on | R3 |
| to touch the sudden fruit the ripe choice fruit | P3 |
| to be garnered for my dear ones mine for them | X2 |
| but long since I have learned in weariness | R |
| in failures and in toil to put by dreams | R |
| to put by hopes and work as the bird sings | R |
| because God planned me for it For I look | V3 |
| undazzled on the future see the clouds | R |
| and see the sunbeams several not one glow | E |
| I know that I shall find my secret yet | P3 |
| and make my creature here another power | E |
| to change a world's whole life but that achi | W3 |
Augusta Davies Webster
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
Submit Spanish Translation
Submit German Translation
Submit French Translation
About An Inventor
An Inventor is a poem by Augusta Davies Webster. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.
Write your comment about An Inventor poem by Augusta Davies Webster
Best Poems of Augusta Davies Webster