Before I Knocked Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABACAD AEAFAC AGAHAI AJAKAL AMANAO APAQAR ASATAU AVABBefore I knocked and flesh let enter | A |
With liquid hands tapped on the womb | B |
I who was as shapeless as the water | A |
That shaped the Jordan near my home | C |
Was brother to Mnetha's daughter | A |
And sister to the fathering worm | D |
- | |
I who was deaf to spring and summer | A |
Who knew not sun nor moon by name | E |
Felt thud beneath my flesh's armour | A |
As yet was in a molten form | F |
The leaden stars the rainy hammer | A |
Swung by my father from his dome | C |
- | |
I knew the message of the winter | A |
The darted hail the childish snow | G |
And the wind was my sister suitor | A |
Wind in me leaped the hellborn dew | H |
My veins flowed with the Eastern weather | A |
Ungotten I knew night and day | I |
- | |
As yet ungotten I did suffer | A |
The rack of dreams my lily bones | J |
Did twist into a living cipher | A |
And flesh was snipped to cross the lines | K |
Of gallow crosses on the liver | A |
And brambles in the wringing brains | L |
- | |
My throat knew thirst before the structure | A |
Of skin and vein around the well | M |
Where words and water make a mixture | A |
Unfailing till the blood runs foul | N |
My heart knew love my belly hunger | A |
I smelt the maggot in my stool | O |
- | |
And time cast forth my mortal creature | A |
To drift or drown upon the seas | P |
Acquainted with the salt adventure | A |
Of tides that never touch the shores | Q |
I who was rich was made the richer | A |
By sipping at the vine of days | R |
- | |
I born of flesh and ghost was neither | A |
A ghost nor man but mortal ghost | S |
And I was struck down by death's feather | A |
I was a mortal to the last | T |
Long breath that carried to my father | A |
The message of his dying christ | U |
- | |
You who bow down at cross and altar | A |
Remember me and pity Him | V |
Who took my flesh and bone for armour | A |
And doublecrossed my mother's womb | B |
Dylan Thomas
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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