Voyaging Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BCDC EFEF GHIH JIJI KFK LMLN OJFJ PQPR S ST FKFK UHUH VFWF XLXL YZA2Z N B2 C2D2C2F K K E2F2G2H2 I2FI2F KLKL J2KK2K L2M2 K N2 O2 YP2YP2 KFKF P2KQ2K P2FP2F KP2KP2 P2FR2 I2KI2K FP2KP2 S2P2T2F F FT2 T2FT2P2 U2P2J FP2 P2 V2FW2P2 X2S2X2S2for Maxime du Camp | A |
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I | - |
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The wide eyed child in love with maps and plans | B |
Finds the world equal to his appetite | C |
How grand the universe by light of lamps | D |
How petty in the memory's clear sight | C |
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One day we leave with fire in the brain | E |
Heart great with rancour bitter in its mood | F |
Outward we travel on the rolling main | E |
Lulling infinity in finitude | F |
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Some gladly flee their homelands gripped in vice | G |
Some horrors of their childhood others still | H |
Astrologers lost in a woman's eyes | I |
Some perfumed Circe with a tyrant's will | H |
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Not to become a beast each desperate one | J |
Makes himself drunk on space and blazing skies | I |
The gnawing ice the copper burning sun | J |
Efface the scars of kisses and of lies | I |
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But the true voyagers set out to sea | K |
Just for the leaving's sake hearts lift aloft | F |
Nothing dissuades them from their destiny | K |
Something beyond their knowing cries 'We're off ' | - |
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These then whose ecstasies are wide as air | L |
As conscripts dream of cannons have their dreams | M |
Of luxuries beyond what man can bear | L |
Such as the soul has neither named nor seen | N |
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II | - |
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Our actions are grotesque in leaps and bounds | O |
We waltz like balls or tops when day is done | J |
Our curiosity rolls us around | F |
As if a cruel Angel lashed the sun | J |
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Strange thing it is to chase a shifting fake | P |
A goal that's nowhere anywhere at all | Q |
Man whose anticipation stays awake | P |
To find his rest goes racing like a fool | R |
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Our soul's three master seeks the blessed isle | S |
A voice on deck shouts 'Ho there have a look ' | - |
Some crow's nest spy cries in romantic style | S |
'Love glory happiness ' Damn just a rock | T |
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Each isle is named the long awaited sight | F |
The Eldorado of our Destiny | K |
Fancy that grows us orgies in the night | F |
Breaks on a reef in morning's clarity | K |
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Oh the inebriate of distant lands | U |
This sot who sees Americas at will | H |
Must he be chained abandoned on the sands | U |
Whose visions make the gulf more bitter still | H |
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So the old tramp who shumes in the filth | V |
Dreams of a paradise and lifts his head | F |
In his wild eyes Capua and her wealth | W |
Wherever candle glow lights up a shed | F |
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III | - |
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Fabulous voyagers What histories | X |
Are there behind your deep and distant stare | L |
Show us the treasures of your memories | X |
Those jewels and riches made of stars and air | L |
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We're travellers afraid of steam and sail | Y |
Here in our prison every day's the same | Z |
Oh paint across the canvas of our souls | A2 |
Your memoirs with horizon as their frame | Z |
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Tell us what have you seen | N |
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IV | B2 |
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'We've seen the stars | C2 |
And waves and we have seen the sandy shores | D2 |
Despite disasters all our jolts and jars | C2 |
On sea on land we find that we are bored | F |
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The glorious sun across the violet sea | K |
Great sunlit cities dreaming as they lie | - |
Made our heart yearn with fierce intensity | K |
To plunge towards those reflections in the sky | - |
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Rich cities and the grandest mountain spires | E2 |
Somehow could never hold the same allure | F2 |
As shifting clouds the shape of our desires | G2 |
Which left us unfulfilled and insecure | H2 |
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Surely enjoyment quickens passion's spark | I2 |
Desire old tree that fattens on delight | F |
As you grow older toughening your bark | I2 |
You want to see the sun from nearer height | F |
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Do you grow always taller grandest tree | K |
Older than cypress Still we have with care | L |
Brought sketch book pieces from across the sea | K |
For brothers who love all that's strange and rare | L |
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Idols with trunks we've greeted in our time | J2 |
Great palaces enwrought with filigree | K |
And jewelled thrones in luminous design | K2 |
To send your brokers dreams of bankruptcy | K |
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Scant costumes that can stupefy the gaze | L2 |
On painted women every nail and tooth | M2 |
And subtle jugglers wise in serpents' ways ' | - |
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V | K |
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And then and then what more | N2 |
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VI | - |
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' childish dupes | O2 |
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You want the truth We'll tell you without fail | Y |
We never thought to search it out but saw | P2 |
From heights to depths through all the mortal scale | Y |
The numbing spectacle of human flaw | P2 |
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Woman vile slave proud in stupidity | K |
Tasteless and humourless in self conceit | F |
Man greedy tyrant lustful slovenly | K |
Slave of the slave a sewer in the street | F |
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The hangman jokes the martyr sobs and faints | P2 |
The feast of blood is seasoned perfectly | K |
Poison of power drains a tyrant's strength | Q2 |
Whose subjects love the whip's brutality | K |
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Religions like our own in most details | P2 |
Climb skyward on their saints who it is said | F |
Indulge their lusts with hairshirts or with nails | P2 |
As dainty fops sprawl on a feather bed | F |
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Drunk on her genius Humanity | K |
Mad now as she has always been or worse | P2 |
Cries to her God in raging agony | K |
Master my image damn you with this curse | P2 |
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Not quite so foolish bold demented ones | P2 |
Flee from the feeding lot that holds the herd | F |
Their boundless shelter is in opium | R2 |
From all the world such always is the word ' | - |
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VII | - |
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How bitter what we learn from voyaging | I2 |
The small and tedious world gives us to see | K |
Now always the real horror of the thing | I2 |
Ourselves that sad oasis in ennui | K |
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Must one depart or stay Stand it and stay | F |
Leave if you must One runs one finds a space | P2 |
To hide and cheat the deadly enemy | K |
Called Time Alas some run a constant race | P2 |
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The twelve apostles or the Wandering Jew | S2 |
For them no ship avails no ways or means | P2 |
To flee that gladiator others know | T2 |
From infancy how to defeat the fiend | F |
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Finally though his boot is on our chest | F |
Then may we hope and call out 'Onward ho ' | - |
Even as once we set out for the East | F |
Our eyes fixed widely hair blown to and fro | T2 |
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Now sailing on the sea of shades we go | T2 |
With all the plans of passengers well pleased | F |
To hear the voice funereal and low | T2 |
That sings 'This way Come here and take your ease | P2 |
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And eat the Lotus Here we gather in | U2 |
These fruits for hearts that yearn for strange delights | P2 |
Intoxicate yourselves on alien | J |
Enjoyment through these days without a night ' | - |
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We understand the phantom's friendly part | F |
That Pylades who reaches out to tease | P2 |
'Swim towards Electra now to ease your heart ' | - |
She cries and long ago we kissed her knees | P2 |
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VIII | - |
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O Death old captain time to make our trip | V2 |
This country bores us Death Let's get away | F |
Even if sky and sea are black as pitch | W2 |
You know our hearts are full of sunny rays | P2 |
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Serve us your poison sir to treat us well | X2 |
Minds burning we know what we have to do | S2 |
And plunge to depths of Heaven or of Hell | X2 |
To fathom the Unknown and find the new | S2 |
Charles Baudelaire
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