Senlin: His Dark Origins Poem Rhyme Scheme

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Conrad Potter Aiken

Senlin: His Dark Origins Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

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	A
	A
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Senlin sits before us and we see him	B
He smokes his pipe before us and we hear him	B
Is he small with reddish hair	C
Does he light his pipe with meditative stare	C
And a pointed flame reflected in both eyes	D
Is he sad and happy and foolish and wise	D
Did no one see him enter the doors of the city	E
Looking above him at the roofs and trees and skies	D
'I stepped from a cloud' he says 'as evening fell	F
I walked on the sound of a bell	F
I ran with winged heels along a gust	G
Or is it true that I laughed and sprang from dust	G
Has no one in a great autumnal forest	G
When the wind bares the trees	H
Heard the sad horn of Senlin slowly blown	I
Has no one on a mountain in the spring	J
Heard Senlin sing	J
Perhaps I came alone on a snow white horse	K
Riding alone from the deep starred night	L
Perhaps I came on a ship whose sails were music	M
Sailing from moon or sun on a river of light '	-
	-
He lights his pipe with a pointed flame	N
'Yet there were many autumns before I came	N
And many springs And more will come long after	O
There is no horn for me or song or laughter	O
	-
The city dissolves about us and its walls	P
Become an ancient forest There is no sound	Q
Except where an old twig tires and falls	P
Or a lizard among the dead leaves crawls	P
Or a flutter is heard in darkness along the ground	Q
	-
Has Senlin become a forest Do we walk in Senlin	I
Is Senlin the wood we walk in ourselves the world	R
Senlin we cry Senlin again No answer	O
Only soft broken echoes backward whirled	R
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Yet we would say this is no wood at all	S
But a small white room with a lamp upon the wall	S
And Senlin before us pale with reddish hair	C
Lights his pipe with a meditative stare	C
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Senlin walking beside us swings his arms	T
And turns his head to look at walls and trees	H
The wind comes whistling from shrill stars of winter	O
The lights are jewels black roots freeze	H
'Did I then stretch from the bitter earth like these	H
Reaching upward with slow and rigid pain	I
To seek in another air myself again '	-
	-
Immense and solitary in a desert of rocks	U
Behold a bewildered oak	V
With white clouds screaming through its leafy brain	I
'Or was I the single ant or tinier thing	J
That crept from the rocks of buried time	W
And dedicated its holy life to climb	W
From atom to beetling atom jagged grain to grain	I
Patiently out of the darkness we call sleep	X
Into a hollow gigantic world of light	L
Thinking the sky to be its destined shell	F
Hoping to fit it well '	-
	-
The city dissolves about us and its walls	P
Are mountains of rock cruelly carved by wind	Y
Sand streams down their wasting sides sand	Z
Mounts upward slowly about them foot and hand	Z
We crawl and bleed among them Is this Senlin	I
	-
In the desert of Senlin must we live and die	A2
We hear the decay of rocks the crash of boulders	B2
Snarling of sand on sand 'Senlin ' we cry	A2
'Senlin ' again Our shadows revolve in silence	C2
Under the soulless brilliance of blue sky	A2
	-
Yet we would say there are no rocks at all	S
Nor desert of sand here by a city wall	S
White lights jewell the evening black roots freeze	H
And Senlin turns his head to look at trees	H
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It is evening Senlin says and in the evening	J
By a silent shore by a far distant sea	E
White unicorns come gravely down to the water	O
In the lilac dusk they come they are white and stately	E
Stars hang over the purple waveless sea	E
A sea on which no sail was ever lifted	D2
Where a human voice was never heard	E2
The shadows of vague hills are dark on the water	O
The silent stars seem silently to sing	J
And gravely come white unicorns down to the water	O
One by one they come and drink their fill	F2
And daisies burn like stars on the darkened hill	F2
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It is evening Senlin says and in the evening	J
The leaves on the trees abandoned by the light	L
Look to the earth and whisper and are still	F2
The bat with horned wings tumbling through the darkness	G2
Breaks the web and the spider falls to the ground	Q
The starry dewdrop gathers upon the oakleaf	H2
Clings to the edge and falls without a sound	Q
Do maidens spread their white palms to the starlight	L
And walk three steps to the east and clearly sing	J
Do dewdrops fall like a shower of stars from willows	I2
Has the small moon a ghostly ring	J
White skeletons dance on the moonlit grass	J2
Singing maidens are buried in deep graves	K2
The stars hang over a sea like polished glass	J2
And solemnly one by one in the darkness there	C
Neighing far off on the haunted air	C
White unicorns come gravely down to the water	O
	-
No silver bells are heard The westering moon	I
Lights the pale floors of caverns by the sea	E
Wet weed hangs on the rock In shimmering pools	L2
Left on the rocks by the receding sea	E
Starfish slowly turn their white and brown	I
Or writhe on the naked rocks and drown	I
Do sea girls haunt these caves do we hear faint singing	J
Do we hear from under the sea a faint bell ringing	J
Was that a white hand lifted among the bubbles	M2
And fallen softly back	N2
No these shores and caverns are all silent	O2
Dead in the moonlight only far above	P2
On the smooth contours of these headlands	M2
White amid the eternal black	N2
One by one in the moonlight there	C
Neighing far off on the haunted air	C
The unicorns come down to the sea	M2
	-
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Senlin walking before us in the sunlight	L
Bending his small legs in a peculiar way	Q2
Goes to his work with thoughts of the universe	M2
His hands are in his pockets he smokes his pipe	R2
He is happily conscious of roofs and skies	M2
And without turning his head he turns his eyes	M2
To regard white horses drawing a small white hearse	M2
The sky is brilliant between the roofs	M2
The windows flash in the yellow sun	I
On the hard pavement ring the hoofs	M2
The light wheels softly run	I
Bright particles of sunlight fall	S
Quiver and flash gyrate and burn	I
Honey like heat flows down the wall	S
The white spokes dazzle and turn	I
	-
Senlin walking before us in the sunlight	L
Regards the hearse with an introspective eye	A2
'Is it my childhood there ' he asks	M2
'Sealed in a hearse and hurrying by '	-
He taps his trowel against a stone	I
The trowel sings with a silver tone	I
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'Nevertheless I know this well	F
Bury it deep and toll a bell	F
Bury it under land or sea	M2
You cannot bury it save in me '	-
	-
It is as if his soul had become a city	M2
With noisily peopled streets and through these streets	M2
Senlin himself comes driving a small white hearse	M2
'Senlin ' we cry He does not turn his head	S2
But is that Senlin Or is this city Senlin	I
Quietly watching the burial of the dead	S2
Dumbly observing the cort ge of its dead	S2
Yet we would say that all this is but madness	M2
Around a distant corner trots the hearse	M2
And Senlin walks before us in the sunlight	L
Happily conscious of his universe	M2
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In the hot noon in an old and savage garden	I
The peach tree grows Its cruel and ugly roots	M2
Rend and rifle the silent earth for moisture	O
Above in the blue hang warm and golden fruits	M2
Look how the cancerous roots crack mould and stone	I
Earth if she had a voice would wail her pain	I
Is she the victim or is the tree the victim	T2
Delicate blossoms opened in the rain	I
Black bees flew among them in the sunlight	L
And sacked them ruthlessly and no a bird	E2
Hangs sharp eyed in the leaves and pecks the fruit	U2
And the peach tree dreams and does not say a word	E2
Senlin tapping his trowel against a stone	I
Observes this tree he planted it is his own	I
	-
'You will think it strange ' says Senlin 'but this tree	M2
Utters profound things in this garden	I
And in its silence speaks to me	M2
I have sensations when I stand beneath it	V2
As if its leaves looked at me and c	M2