The Yew-berry Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABBBCDDEFEGGGHIIJJJK KK ALLLMMMNNNOPPQQQRRS AAAATTTPPPUUUVVVWWW IXXXYYYSRRZZZKKKA2A2 A2B2B2B2C2C2C2D2D2D2| I | A |
| I call this idle history the Berry of the Yew | B |
| Because there's nothing sweeter than its husk of scarlet glue | B |
| And nothing half so bitter as its black core bitten through | B |
| I loved saw hope and said so learn'd that Laura loved again | C |
| Why speak of joy then suffer'd My head throbs and I would fain | D |
| Find words to lay the spectre starting now before my brain | D |
| She loved me all things told it eye to eye and palm to palm | E |
| As the pause upon the ceasing of a thousand voiced psalm | F |
| Was the mighty satisfaction and the full eternal calm | E |
| On her face when she was laughing was the seriousness within | G |
| Her sweetest smiles and sweeter did a lover never win | G |
| In passing grew so absent that they made her fair cheek thin | G |
| On her face when she was speaking thoughts unworded used to live | H |
| So that when she whisper'd to me Better joy Earth cannot give | I |
| Her following silence added But Earth's joy is fugitive | I |
| For there a nameless something though suppress'd still spread around | J |
| The same was on her eyelids if she look'd towards the ground | J |
| In her laughing singing talking still the same was in the sound | J |
| A sweet dissatisfaction which at no time went away | K |
| But shadow'd on her spirit even at its brightest play | K |
| That her mirth was like the sunshine in the closing of the day | K |
| - | |
| - | |
| II | A |
| Let none ask joy the highest save those who would have it end | L |
| There's weight in earthly blessings they are earthy and they tend | L |
| By predetermin'd impulse at their highest to descend | L |
| I still for a happy season in the present saw the past | M |
| Mistaking one for the other feeling sure my hold was fast | M |
| On that of which the symbols vanish'd daily but at last | M |
| As when we watch bright cloud banks round about the low sun ranged | N |
| We suddenly remember some rich glory gone or changed | N |
| All at once I comprehended that her love was grown estranged | N |
| From this time spectral glimpses of a darker fear came on | O |
| They came but since I scorn'd them were no sooner come than gone | P |
| At times some gap in sequence frees the spirit and anon | P |
| We remember states of living ended ere we left the womb | Q |
| And see a vague aurora flashing to us from the tomb | Q |
| The dreamy light of new states dash'd tremendously with gloom | Q |
| We tremble for an instant and a single instant more | R |
| Brings absolute oblivion and we pass on as before | R |
| Ev'n so those dreadful glimpses came and startled and were o'er | S |
| - | |
| - | |
| III | A |
| One morning one bright morning Wortley met me He and I | A |
| As we rode across the country met a friend of his His eye | A |
| Caught Wortley's who rode past him What said he pass old friends by | A |
| So I've heard your game is grounded Why your life's one long romance | T |
| After your last French fashion But ah ha should Herbert chance | T |
| Nay Herbert's here said he and introduced me with a glance | T |
| Of easy smiles ignoring this embarrassment and then | P |
| This pass'd off and soon after I went home and took a pen | P |
| And wrote the signs here written with much more and where and when | P |
| And having read them over once or twice sat down to think | U |
| From time to time beneath them writing more till link by link | U |
| The evidence against her was fulfill'd I did not shrink | U |
| But I read them all together and I found it was no dream | V |
| What I felt I can't remember an oblivion which the gleam | V |
| Of light which oft comes through it shews for blessedness extreme | V |
| At last I moved exclaiming I will not believe until | W |
| I've spoken once with Laura Thereon all my heart grew still | W |
| For doubt and faith are active and decisions of the will | W |
| - | |
| - | |
| IV | I |
| I found my Love She started I suppose that I was pale | X |
| We talk'd but words on both sides seem'd to sicken flag and fail | X |
| Then I gave her what I'd written watching whether she would quail | X |
| In and out flew sultry blushes so when red reflections rise | Y |
| From conflagrations filling the alarm'd heart with surmise | Y |
| They lighten now now darken up and down the gloomy skies | Y |
| She finish'd once but fearing to look from it read it o'er | S |
| Ten times at least Poor Laura had those readings been ten score | R |
| That refuge from confusion had confused thee more and more | R |
| I said You're ill sit Laura and she sat down and was meek | Z |
| Ah tears not lost to God then But pray Laura do not speak | Z |
| I understand you better by the moisture on your cheek | Z |
| She shook with sobs in silence I yet checking passion's sway | K |
| Said only Farewell Laura then got up and strode away | K |
| For I felt that she would burst my heart asunder should I stay | K |
| Oh ghastly corpse of Love so slain it makes the world its hearse | A2 |
| Or as the sun extinct and dead after the doomsday curse | A2 |
| It rolls an unseen danger through the darken'd universe | A2 |
| I struggled to forget this but forgetfulness too sweet | B2 |
| It startled with its sweetness thus involv'd its own defeat | B2 |
| And every time this happen'd aching memory would repeat | B2 |
| The shock of that discovery so at length I learn'd by heart | C2 |
| And never save when sleeping suffer'd thenceforth to depart | C2 |
| The feeling of my sorrow and in time this sooth'd the smart | C2 |
| Yet even now not seldom in my leisure in the thick | D2 |
| Of other thoughts unchallenged words and looks come crowding quick | D2 |
| They do while I am writing till the sunshine makes me sick | D2 |
Coventry Patmore
(1)
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