Jenny Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: AABBCCDDEEFGHHEEIIAA AJJKKBBLLMMNNOOPPQQR RSMTTEEPPUUUHHVVWXYY PPPPYAPPZZA2A2B2C2D2 D2E2E2EEPPF2F2YYG2G2 H2H2PPI2I2J2J2PPPPZZ K2K2KKF2F2KKPPPHHL2L 2PPL2L2EEEPPAAC2C2L2 L2YYF2F2PPPPPPF2F2PP B2C2EEM2N2PPPPPPF2F2 L2L2PPPPL2L2PPPPEEPP L2L2L2L2L2PPF2F2L2L2 KKXXYYEEF2F2EEL2L2L2 PPF2F2O2O2F2F2AAAPPL 2L2L2L2E2E2EEP2

Lazy laughing languid JennyA
Fond of a kiss and fond of a guineaA
Whose head upon my knee to nightB
Rests for a while as if grown lightB
With all our dances and the soundC
To which the wild tunes spun you roundC
Fair Jenny mine the thoughtless queenD
Of kisses which the blush betweenD
Could hardly make much daintierE
Whose eyes are as blue skies whose hairE
Is countless gold incomparableF
Fresh flower scarce touched with signs that tellG
Of Love's exuberant hotbed NayH
Poor flower left torn since yesterdayH
Until to morrow leave you bareE
Poor handful of bright spring waterE
Flung in the whirlpool's shrieking faceI
Poor shameful Jenny full of graceI
Thus with your head upon my kneeA
Whose person or whose purse may beA
The lodestar of your reverieA
This room of yours my Jenny looksJ
A change from mine so full of booksJ
Whose serried ranks hold fast forsoothK
So many captive hours of youthK
The hours they thieve from day and nightB
To make one's cherished work come rightB
And leave it wrong for all their theftL
Even as to night my work was leftL
Until I vowed that since my brainM
And eyes of dancing seemed so fainM
My feet should have some dancing tooN
And thus it was I met with youN
Well I suppose 'twas hard to partO
For here I am And now sweetheartO
You seem too tired to get to bedP
It was a careless life I ledP
When rooms like this were scarce so strangeQ
Not long ago What breeds the changeQ
The many aims or the few yearsR
Because to night it all appearsR
Something I do not know againS
The cloud's not danced out of my brainM
The cloud that made it turn and swimT
While hour by hour the books grew dimT
Why Jenny as I watch you thereE
For all your wealth of loosened hairE
Your silk ungirdled and unlac'dP
And warm sweets open to the waistP
All golden in the lamplight's gleamU
You know not what a book you seemU
Half read by lightning in a dreamU
How should you know my Jenny NayH
And I should be ashamed to sayH
Poor beauty so well worth a kissV
But while my thought runs on like thisV
With wasteful whims more than enoughW
I wonder what you're thinking ofX
If of myself you think at allY
What is the thought conjecturalY
On sorry matters best unsolvedP
Or inly is each grace revolvedP
To fit me with a lure or sadP
To think perhaps you're merely gladP
That I'm not drunk or ruffianlyY
And let you rest upon my kneeA
For sometimes were the truth confess'dP
You're thankful for a little restP
Glad from the crush to rest withinZ
From the heart sickness and the dinZ
Where envy's voice at virtue's pitchA2
Mocks you because your gown is richA2
And from the pale girl's dumb rebukeB2
Whose ill clad grace and toil worn lookC2
Proclaim the strength that keeps her weakD2
And other nights than yours bespeakD2
And from the wise unchildish elfE2
To schoolmate lesser than himselfE2
Pointing you out what thing you areE
Yes from the daily jeer and jarE
From shame and shame's outbraving tooP
Is rest not sometimes sweet to youP
But most from the hatefulness of manF2
Who spares not to end what he beganF2
Whose acts are ill and his speech illY
Who having used you at his willY
Thrusts you aside as when I dineG2
I serve the dishes and the wineG2
Well handsome Jenny mine sit upH2
I've filled our glasses let us supH2
And do not let me think of youP
Lest shame of yours suffice for twoP
What still so tired Well well then keepI2
Your head there so you do not sleepI2
But that the weariness may passJ2
And leave you merry take this glassJ2
Ah lazy lily hand more bless'dP
If ne'er in rings it had been dress'dP
Nor ever by a glove conceal'dP
Behold the lilies of the fieldP
They toil not neither do they spinZ
So doth the ancient text beginZ
Not of such rest as one of theseK2
Can share Another rest and easeK2
Along each summer sated pathK
From its new lord the garden hathK
Than that whose spring in blessings ranF2
Which praised the bounteous husbandmanF2
Ere yet in days of hankering breathK
The lilies sickened unto deathK
What Jenny are your lilies deadP
Aye and the snow white leaves are spreadP
Like winter on the garden bedP
But you had roses left in MayH
They were not gone too Jenny nayH
But must your roses die and thoseL2
Their purfled buds that should uncloseL2
Even so the leaves are curled apartP
Still red as from the broken heartP
And here's the naked stem of thornsL2
Nay nay mere words Here nothing warnsL2
As yet of winter Sickness hereE
Or want alone could waken fearE
Nothing but passion wrings a tearE
Except when there may rise unsoughtP
Haply at times a passing thoughtP
Of the old days which seem to beA
Much older than any historyA
That is written in any bookC2
When she would lie in fields and lookC2
Along the ground through the blown grassL2
And wonder where the city wasL2
Far out of sight whose broil and baleY
They told her then for a child's taleY
Jenny you know the city nowF2
A child can tell the tale there howF2
Some things which are not yet enroll'dP
In market lists are bought and soldP
Even till the early Sunday lightP
When Saturday night is market nightP
Everywhere be it dry or wetP
And market night in the HaymarketP
Our learned London children knowF2
Poor Jenny all your pride and woeF2
Have seen your lifted silken skirtP
Advertise dainties through the dirtP
Have seen your coach wheels splash rebukeB2
On virtue and have learned your lookC2
When wealth and health slipped past you stareE
Along the streets alone and thereE
Round the long park across the bridgeM2
The cold lamps at the pavement's edgeN2
Wind on together and apartP
A fiery serpent for your heartP
Let the thoughts pass an empty cloudP
Suppose I were to think aloudP
What if to her all this were saidP
Why as a volume seldom readP
Being opened halfway shuts againF2
So might the pages of her brainF2
Be parted at such words and thenceL2
Close back upon the dusty senseL2
For is there hue or shape defin'dP
In Jenny's desecrated mindP
Where all contagious currents meetP
A Lethe of the middle streetP
Nay it reflects not any faceL2
Nor sound is in its sluggish paceL2
But as they coil those eddies clotP
And night and day remember notP
Why Jenny you're asleep at lastP
Asleep poor Jenny hard and fastP
So young and soft and tired so fairE
With chin thus nestled in your hairE
Mouth quiet eyelids almost blueP
As if some sky of dreams shone throughP
Just as another woman sleepsL2
Enough to throw one's thoughts in heapsL2
Of doubt and horror what to sayL2
Or think this awful secret swayL2
The potter's power over the clayL2
Of the same lump it has been saidP
For honour and dishonour madeP
Two sister vessels Here is oneF2
My cousin Nell is fond of funF2
And fond of dress and change and praiseL2
So mere a woman in her waysL2
And if her sweet eyes rich in youthK
Are like her lips that tell the truthK
My cousin Nell is fond of loveX
And she's the girl I'm proudest ofX
Who does not prize her guard her wellY
The love of change in cousin NellY
Shall find the best and hold it dearE
The unconquered mirth turn quieterE
Not through her own through others' woeF2
The conscious pride of beauty glowF2
Beside another's pride in herE
One little part of all they shareE
For Love himself shall ripen theseL2
In a kind soil to just increaseL2
Through years of fertilizing peaceL2
Of the same lump as it is saidP
For honour and dishonour madeP
Two sister vessels Here is oneF2
It makes a goblin of the sunF2
So pure so fall'n How dare to thinkO2
Of the first common kindred linkO2
Yet Jenny till the world shall burnF2
It seems that all things take their turnF2
And who shall say but this fair treeA
May need in changes that may beA
Your children's children's charityA
Scorned then no doubt as you are scorn'dP
Shall no man hold his pride forewarn'dP
Till in the end the Day of DaysL2
At Judgment one of his own raceL2
As frail and lost as you shall riseL2
His daughter with his mother's eyesL2
How Jenny's clock ticks on the shelfE2
Might not the dial scorn itselfE2
That has such hours to registerE
Yet as to me even so to herE
Are golden sun and silver mP2

Dante Gabriel Rossetti



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