The Moondial Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABAB CDCD EFEF GHGH IJKJ LMLM NNNN LOLO NNNN PNPN LNLN NQNQ LRLR NNNN NSNS NLNLIron and granite and rust | A |
In a crumbling garden old | B |
Where the roses are paler than dust | A |
And the lilies are green with gold | B |
- | |
Under the racing moon | C |
Inconscious of war or crime | D |
In a strange and ghostly noon | C |
It marks the oblivion of time | D |
- | |
The shadow steals through its arc | E |
Still as a frosted breath | F |
Fitful gleaming and dark | E |
As the cold frustration of death | F |
- | |
But where the shadow may fall | G |
Whether to hurry or stay | H |
It matters little at all | G |
To those who come that way | H |
- | |
For this is the dial of them | I |
That have forgotten the world | J |
No more through the mad day dream | K |
Of striving and reason hurled | J |
- | |
Their heart as a little child | L |
Only remembers the worth | M |
Of beauty and love and the wild | L |
Dark peace of the elder earth | M |
- | |
It registers the morrows | N |
Of lovers and winds and streams | N |
And the face of a thousand sorrows | N |
At the postern gate of dreams | N |
- | |
When the first low laughter smote | L |
Through Lilith the mother of joy | O |
And died and revived from the throat | L |
Of Helen the harpstring of Troy | O |
- | |
And wandering on through the years | N |
From the sobbing rain and the sea | N |
Caught sound of the world's gray tears | N |
Or sense of the sun's gold glee | N |
- | |
Whenever the wild control | P |
Burned out to a mortal kiss | N |
And the shuddering storm swept soul | P |
Climbed to its acme of bliss | N |
- | |
The green gold light of the dead | L |
Stood still in purple space | N |
And a record blind and dread | L |
Was graved on the dial's face | N |
- | |
And once in a thousand years | N |
Some youth who loved so well | Q |
The gods had loosed him from fears | N |
In a vision of blameless hell | Q |
- | |
Has gone to the dial to read | L |
Those signs in the outland tongue | R |
Written beyond the need | L |
Of the simple and the young | R |
- | |
For immortal life they say | N |
Were his who loving so | N |
Could explain the writing away | N |
As a legend written in snow | N |
- | |
But always his innocent eyes | N |
Were frozen into the stone | S |
From that awful first surprise | N |
His soul must return alone | S |
- | |
In the morning there he lay | N |
Dead in the sun's warm gold | L |
And no man knows to this day | N |
What the dim moondial told | L |
Bliss Carman
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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