The Thorn Forest Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABC BD EFG HIF JI JKJ KL LML NOM PQ| Then dark with dripping blood it gave a howl | A |
| and cried again 'Our damaged branches ache | B |
| Your pillage maims me Can't you feel at all | C |
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| We who were men are now this barren brake | B |
| You'd grant us your respect and stay your hand | D |
| were we a thicket not of souls but snakes ' | - |
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| As wood still green starts burning at one end | E |
| and from its unlit end the burning stick | F |
| drips sap and hisses with escaping wind | G |
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| so from the broken stump there oozed a mix | H |
| of words and blood a frothy babbling gore | I |
| I dropped the branch My fear had made me sick | F |
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| 'Poor wounded soul could he have grasped before ' | - |
| my sage replied 'what now he sees is true | J |
| and blindly trusted in poetic lore | I |
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| then he need not have so insulted you | J |
| But as there was no other way to learn | K |
| I urged him to a test that grieved me too | J |
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| Tell us who you were that he in turn | K |
| can set your honor freshly back in style | L |
| among those he will teach when he returns ' | - |
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| The trunk 'Your speech by raising hope that I'll | L |
| regain repute makes words arise in me | M |
| I mean to talk if you will stay a while | L |
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| I was the one entrusted with the keys | N |
| to Federigo's mind and it was sweet | O |
| to share his thought and guard his strategy | M |
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| for noble ventures secret in my keep | P |
| so faithfully I filled this glorious post | Q |
| I gladly sacrificed my health and sleep ' | - |
Dante Alighieri
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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