The Vampire Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AAABCCCB DDDEFFFE GGGHIIH JJJKLLK MMMNOOON PPPPQQQP RRRSRR RRPPPPP PBPPBPB PPPTP UVUPWWP PPXPPPX RRRYZZZY BBBPA2A2A2PShe rose among us where we lay | A |
She wept we put our work away | A |
She chilled our laughter stilled our play | A |
And spread a silence there | B |
And darkness shot across the sky | C |
And once and twice we heard her cry | C |
And saw her lift white hands on high | C |
And toss her troubled hair | B |
- | |
What shape was this who came to us | D |
With basilisk eyes so ominous | D |
With mouth so sweet so poisonous | D |
And tortured hands so pale | E |
We saw her wavering to and fro | F |
Through dark and wind we saw her go | F |
Yet what her name was did not know | F |
And felt our spirits fail | E |
- | |
We tried to turn away but still | G |
Above we heard her sorrow thrill | G |
And those that slept they dreamed of ill | G |
And dreadful things | H |
Of skies grown red with rending flames | I |
And shuddering hills that cracked their frames | I |
Of twilights foul with wings | H |
- | |
And skeletons dancing to a tune | J |
And cries of children stifled soon | J |
And over all a blood red moon | J |
A dull and nightmare size | K |
They woke and sought to go their ways | L |
Yet everywhere they met her gaze | L |
Her fixed and burning eyes | K |
- | |
Who are you now we cried to her | M |
Spirit so strange so sinister | M |
We felt dead winds above us stir | M |
And in the darkness heard | N |
A voice fall singing cloying sweet | O |
Heavily dropping though that heat | O |
Heavy as honeyed pulses beat | O |
Slow word by anguished word | N |
- | |
And through the night strange music went | P |
With voice and cry so darkly blent | P |
We could not fathom what they meant | P |
Save only that they seemed | P |
To thin the blood along our veins | Q |
Foretelling vile delirious pains | Q |
And clouds divulging blood red rains | Q |
Upon a hill undreamed | P |
- | |
And this we heard 'Who dies for me | R |
He shall possess me secretly | R |
My terrible beauty he shall see | R |
And slake my body's flame | S |
But who denies me cursed shall be | R |
And slain and buried loathsomely | R |
And slimed upon with shame ' | - |
- | |
And darkness fell And like a sea | R |
Of stumbling deaths we followed we | R |
Who dared not stay behind | P |
There all night long beneath a cloud | P |
We rose and fell we struck and bowed | P |
We were the ploughman and the ploughed | P |
Our eyes were red and blind | P |
- | |
And some they said had touched her side | P |
Before she fled us there | B |
And some had taken her to bride | P |
And some lain down for her and died | P |
Who had not touched her hair | B |
Ran to and fro and cursed and cried | P |
And sought her everywhere | B |
- | |
'Her eyes have feasted on the dead | P |
And small and shapely is her head | P |
And dark and small her mouth ' they said | P |
'And beautiful to kiss | T |
Her mouth is sinister and red | P |
As blood in moonlight is ' | - |
- | |
Then poets forgot their jeweled words | U |
And cut the sky with glittering swords | V |
And innocent souls turned carrion birds | U |
To perch upon the dead | P |
Sweet daisy fields were drenched with death | W |
The air became a charnel breath | W |
Pale stones were splashed with red | P |
- | |
Green leaves were dappled bright with blood | P |
And fruit trees murdered in the bud | P |
And when at length the dawn | X |
Came green as twilight from the east | P |
And all that heaving horror ceased | P |
Silent was every bird and beast | P |
And that dark voice was gone | X |
- | |
No word was there no song no bell | R |
No furious tongue that dream to tell | R |
Only the dead who rose and fell | R |
Above the wounded men | Y |
And whisperings and wails of pain | Z |
Blown slowly from the wounded grain | Z |
Blown slowly from the smoking plain | Z |
And silence fallen again | Y |
- | |
Until at dusk from God knows where | B |
Beneath dark birds that filled the air | B |
Like one who did not hear or care | B |
Under a blood red cloud | P |
An aged ploughman came alone | A2 |
And drove his share through flesh and bone | A2 |
And turned them under to mould and stone | A2 |
All night long he ploughed | P |
Conrad Potter Aiken
(1)
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