Aspiring Miss De Laine Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AAABBCCDD EEEFFGGHH IIJJKKLLGG MMNNHHOOPPJJQQQRR STSTEEUUAA LLQQPPAAVG JJGGPPHHGGQQHHWWGGUU OOGGXXSSJJYYY JJUUGGG UUJJSSGGUUUPPZZGGAA A2A2NNJJQQQJQ JJSSUUB2B2C2D2LSGGQQ AAGGE2E2JJ AJZJF2G2 F2H2LLJJJ GGQQI2I2HHJ2J2Certain facts which serve to explain | A |
The physical charms of Miss Addie De Laine | A |
Who as the common reports obtain | A |
Surpassed in complexion the lily and rose | B |
With a very sweet mouth and a retrousse nose | B |
A figure like Hebe's or that which revolves | C |
In a milliner's window and partially solves | C |
That question which mentor and moralist pains | D |
If grace may exist minus feeling or brains | D |
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Of course the young lady had beaux by the score | E |
All that she wanted what girl could ask more | E |
Lovers that sighed and lovers that swore | E |
Lovers that danced and lovers that played | F |
Men of profession of leisure and trade | F |
But one who was destined to take the high part | G |
Of holding that mythical treasure her heart | G |
This lover the wonder and envy of town | H |
Was a practicing chemist a fellow called Brown | H |
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I might here remark that 'twas doubted by many | I |
In regard to the heart if Miss Addie had any | I |
But no one could look in that eloquent face | J |
With its exquisite outline and features of grace | J |
And mark through the transparent skin how the tide | K |
Ebbed and flowed at the impulse of passion or pride | K |
None could look who believed in the blood's circulation | L |
As argued by Harvey but saw confirmation | L |
That here at least Nature had triumphed o'er art | G |
And as far as complexion went she had a heart | G |
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But this par parenthesis Brown was the man | M |
Preferred of all others to carry her fan | M |
Hook her glove drape her shawl and do all that a belle | N |
May demand of the lover she wants to treat well | N |
Folks wondered and stared that a fellow called Brown | H |
Abstracted and solemn in manner a clown | H |
Ill dressed with a lingering smell of the shop | O |
Should appear as her escort at party or hop | O |
Some swore he had cooked up some villainous charm | P |
Or love philter not in the regular Pharm | P |
Acopoeia and thus from pure malice prepense | J |
Had bewitched and bamboozled the young lady's sense | J |
Others thought with more reason the secret to lie | Q |
In a magical wash or indelible dye | Q |
While Society with its censorious eye | Q |
And judgment impartial stood ready to damn | R |
What wasn't improper as being a sham | R |
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For a fortnight the townfolk had all been agog | S |
With a party the finest the season had seen | T |
To be given in honor of Miss Pollywog | S |
Who was just coming out as a belle of sixteen | T |
The guests were invited but one night before | E |
A carriage drew up at the modest back door | E |
Of Brown's lab'ratory and full in the glare | U |
Of a big purple bottle some closely veiled fair | U |
Alighted and entered to make matters plain | A |
Spite of veils and disguises 'twas Addie De Laine | A |
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As a bower for true love 'twas hardly the one | L |
That a lady would choose to be wooed in or won | L |
No odor of rose or sweet jessamine's sigh | Q |
Breathed a fragrance to hallow their pledge of troth by | Q |
Nor the balm that exhales from the odorous thyme | P |
But the gaseous effusions of chloride of lime | P |
And salts which your chemist delights to explain | A |
As the base of the smell of the rose and the drain | A |
Think of this O ye lovers of sweetness and know | V |
What you smell when you snuff up Lubin or Pinaud | G |
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I pass by the greetings the transports and bliss | J |
Which of course duly followed a meeting like this | J |
And come down to business for such the intent | G |
Of the lady who now o'er the crucible leant | G |
In the glow of a furnace of carbon and lime | P |
Like a fairy called up in the new pantomime | P |
And give but her words as she coyly looked down | H |
In reply to the questioning glances of Brown | H |
I am taking the drops and am using the paste | G |
And the little white powders that had a sweet taste | G |
Which you told me would brighten the glance of my eye | Q |
And the depilatory and also the dye | Q |
And I'm charmed with the trial and now my dear Brown | H |
I have one other favor now ducky don't frown | H |
Only one for a chemist and genius like you | W |
But a trifle and one you can easily do | W |
Now listen to morrow you know is the night | G |
Of the birthday soiree of that Pollywog fright | G |
And I'm to be there and the dress I shall wear | U |
Is too lovely but But what then ma chere | U |
Said Brown as the lady came to a full stop | O |
And glanced round the shelves of the little back shop | O |
Well I want I want something to fill out the skirt | G |
To the proper dimensions without being girt | G |
In a stiff crinoline or caged in a hoop | X |
That shows through one's skirt like the bars of a coop | X |
Something light that a lady may waltz in or polk | S |
With a freedom that none but you masculine folk | S |
Ever know For however poor woman aspires | J |
She's always bound down to the earth by these wires | J |
Are you listening Nonsense don't stare like a spoon | Y |
Idiotic some light thing and spacious and soon | Y |
Something like well in fact something like a balloon | Y |
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Here she paused and here Brown overcome by surprise | J |
Gave a doubting assent with still wondering eyes | J |
And the lady departed But just at the door | U |
Something happened 'tis true it had happened before | U |
In this sanctum of science a sibilant sound | G |
Like some element just from its trammels unbound | G |
Or two substances that their affinities found | G |
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The night of the anxiously looked for soiree | U |
Had come with its fair ones in gorgeous array | U |
With the rattle of wheels and the tinkle of bells | J |
And the How do ye do's and the Hope you are well's | J |
And the crush in the passage and last lingering look | S |
You give as you hang your best hat on the hook | S |
The rush of hot air as the door opens wide | G |
And your entry that blending of self possessed pride | G |
And humility shown in your perfect bred stare | U |
At the folk as if wondering how they got there | U |
With other tricks worthy of Vanity Fair | U |
Meanwhile the safe topic the beat of the room | P |
Already was losing its freshness and bloom | P |
Young people were yawning and wondering when | Z |
The dance would come off and why didn't it then | Z |
When a vague expectation was thrilling the crowd | G |
Lo the door swung its hinges with utterance proud | G |
And Pompey announced with a trumpet like strain | A |
The entrance of Brown and Miss Addie De Laine | A |
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She entered but oh how imperfect the verb | A2 |
To express to the senses her movement superb | A2 |
To say that she sailed in more clearly might tell | N |
Her grace in its buoyant and billowy swell | N |
Her robe was a vague circumambient space | J |
With shadowy boundaries made of point lace | J |
The rest was but guesswork and well might defy | Q |
The power of critical feminine eye | Q |
To define or describe 'twere as futile to try | Q |
The gossamer web of the cirrus to trace | J |
Floating far in the blue of a warm summer sky | Q |
- | |
'Midst the humming of praises and glances of beaux | J |
That greet our fair maiden wherever she goes | J |
Brown slipped like a shadow grim silent and black | S |
With a look of anxiety close in her track | S |
Once he whispered aside in her delicate ear | U |
A sentence of warning it might be of fear | U |
Don't stand in a draught if you value your life | B2 |
Nothing more such advice might be given your wife | B2 |
Or your sweetheart in times of bronchitis and cough | C2 |
Without mystery romance or frivolous scoff | D2 |
But hark to the music the dance has begun | L |
The closely draped windows wide open are flung | S |
The notes of the piccolo joyous and light | G |
Like bubbles burst forth on the warm summer night | G |
Round about go the dancers in circles they fly | Q |
Trip trip go their feet as their skirts eddy by | Q |
And swifter and lighter but somewhat too plain | A |
Whisks the fair circumvolving Miss Addie De Laine | A |
Taglioni and Cerito well might have pined | G |
For the vigor and ease that her movements combined | G |
E'en Rigelboche never flung higher her robe | E2 |
In the naughtiest city that's known on the globe | E2 |
'Twas amazing 'twas scandalous lost in surprise | J |
Some opened their mouths and a few shut their eyes | J |
- | |
But hark At the moment Miss Addie De Laine | A |
Circling round at the outer edge of an ellipse | J |
Which brought her fair form to the window again | Z |
From the arms of her partner incautiously slips | J |
And a shriek fills the air and the music is still | F2 |
And the crowd gather round where her partner forlorn | G2 |
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Still frenziedly points from the wide window sill | F2 |
Into space and the night for Miss Addie was gone | H2 |
Gone like the bubble that bursts in the sun | L |
Gone like the grain when the reaper is done | L |
Gone like the dew on the fresh morning grass | J |
Gone without parting farewell and alas | J |
Gone with a flavor of hydrogen gas | J |
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When the weather is pleasant you frequently meet | G |
A white headed man slowly pacing the street | G |
His trembling hand shading his lack lustre eye | Q |
Half blind with continually scanning the sky | Q |
Rumor points him as some astronomical sage | I2 |
Re perusing by day the celestial page | I2 |
But the reader sagacious will recognize Brown | H |
Trying vainly to conjure his lost sweetheart down | H |
And learn the stern moral this story must teach | J2 |
That Genius may lift its love out of its reach | J2 |
Bret Harte (francis)
(1)
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