Shakespeare Himself: For The Unveiling Of Mr. Partridge's Statue Of The Poet Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABACDBDEDEFEFGFG DGDHHHIH IJIKLJLHMH NHNOPOHQHRHSHBHHHH THUHUHHHHVHVWVWHW HWHWWWWWWW XWYZXZA2ZA2HA2 HHHHB2HB2BB2C2The body is no prison where we lie | A |
Shut out from our true heritage of sun | B |
It is the wings wherewith the soul may fly | A |
Save through this flesh so scorned and spat upon | C |
No ray of light had reached the caverned mind | D |
No thrill of pleasure through the life had run | B |
No love of nature or of humankind | D |
Were it but love of self had stirred the heart | E |
To its first deed Such freedom as we find | D |
We find but through its service not apart | E |
And as an eagle's wings upbear him higher | F |
Than Andes or Himalaya and chart | E |
Rivers and seas beneath so our desire | F |
With more celestial members yet may soar | G |
Into the space of empyrean fire | F |
Still bodied but more richly than before | G |
- | |
The body is the man what lurks behind | D |
Through it alone unveils itself Therefore | G |
We are not wrong who seek to keep in mind | D |
The form and feature of the mighty dead | H |
So back of all the giving is divined | H |
The giver back of all things done or said | H |
The man himself in elemental speech | I |
Of flesh and bone and sinew utter d | H |
- | |
This is thy language Sculpture Thine to reach | I |
Beneath all thoughts all feelings all desires | J |
To that which thinks and lives and loves and teach | I |
The world the primal selfhood of its sires | K |
Its heroes and its lovers and its gods | L |
So shall Apollo flame in marble fires | J |
The mien of Zeus suffice before he nods | L |
So Gautama in ivory dream out | H |
The calm of Time's untrammelled periods | M |
So Sigurd's lips be in themselves a shout | H |
- | |
Mould us our Shakespeare sculptor in the form | N |
His comrades knew rare Ben and all the rout | H |
That found the taproom of the Mermaid warm | N |
With wit and wine and fellowship the face | O |
Wherein the men he chummed with found a charm | P |
To make them love him carve for us the grace | O |
That caught Anne Hathaway in Shottery side | H |
The hand that clasped Southampton's in the days | Q |
Ere that dark dame of passion and of pride | H |
Burned in his heart the brand of her disdain | R |
The eyes that wept when little Hamnet died | H |
The lips that learned from Marlowe's and again | S |
Taught riper lore to Fletcher and the rest | H |
The presence and demeanor sovereign | B |
At last at Stratford calm and manifest | H |
That rested on the seventh day and scanned | H |
His work and knew it good and left the quest | H |
And like his own enchanter broke his wand | H |
- | |
No viewless mind The very shape no less | T |
He used to speak and smile with move and stand | H |
God is most God not in his loneliness | U |
Unfellowed discreationed unrevealed | H |
Nor thundering on Sinai pitiless | U |
Nor when the seven vials are unsealed | H |
But when his spirit companions with our thought | H |
And in his fellowship our pain is healed | H |
And we are likest God when we are brought | H |
Most near to all men Bring us near to him | V |
The gentle human soul whose calm might wrought | H |
Imperious Lear and made our eyes grow dim | V |
For Imogen who though he heard the spheres | W |
Still choiring to the young eyed cherubim | V |
Could laugh with Falstaff and his loose compeers | W |
And love the rascal with the same big heart | H |
That o'er Cordelia could not stay its tears | W |
- | |
For still the man is greater than his art | H |
And though thy men and women Shakespeare rise | W |
Like giants in our fancy and depart | H |
Thyself art more than all their masteries | W |
Thy wisdom more than Hamlet's questionings | W |
Or the cold searching of Ulysses' eyes | W |
Thy mirth more sweet than Benedick's flouts and flings | W |
Thy smiling dearer than Mercutio's | W |
Thy dignity past that of all thy kings | W |
And thy enchantment more than Prospero's | W |
- | |
For thou couldst not have had Othello's flaw | X |
Not erred with Brutus greater then than those | W |
For all their nobleness Oh albeit with awe | Y |
Leave we the mighty phantoms and draw near | Z |
The man that fashioned them and gave them law | X |
The Master Poet found with scarce a peer | Z |
In all the ages his domain to share | A2 |
Yet of all singers gentlest and most dear | Z |
Oh how shall words thy proper praise declare | A2 |
Divine in thy supreme humanity | H |
And near as the inevitable air | A2 |
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So he that wrought this image deemed of thee | H |
So I thy lover keep thee in my heart | H |
So may this figure set for men to see | H |
Where the world passes eager for the mart | H |
Be as a sudden insight of the soul | B2 |
That makes a darkness into order start | H |
And lift thee up for all men fair and whole | B2 |
Till scholar merchant farmer artisan | B |
Seeing divine beneath the aureole | B2 |
The fellow heart and know thee for a man | C2 |
Bliss Carman (william)
(1)
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