The World-saver Poem Rhyme Scheme

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Edgar Lee Masters

The World-saver Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

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If the grim Fates to stave ennui	A
Play whips for fun or snares for game	B
The liar full of ease goes free	A
And Socrates must bear the shame	B
	-
With the blunt sage he stands despised	C
The Pharisees salute him not	D
Laughter awaits the truth he prized	C
And Judas profits by his plot	D
	-
A million angels kneel and pray	E
And sue for grace that he may win	F
Eternal Jove prepares the day	E
And sternly sets the fateful gin	F
	-
Satan who hates the light is fain	G
To back his virtuous enterprise	H
The omnipotent powers alone refrain	G
Only the Lord of hosts denies	H
	-
Whatever of woven argument	I
Lacks warp to hold the woof in place	J
Smothers his honest discontent	K
But leaves to view his woeful face	J
	-
Fling forth the flag devour the land	L
Grasp destiny and use the law	M
But dodge the epigram's keen brand	L
And fall not by the ass's jaw	M
	-
The idiot snicker strikes more down	N
Than fell at Troy or Waterloo	O
Still still he meets it with a frown	N
And argues loudly for the True	O
	-
Injustice lengthens out her chain	G
Greed yet ahungered calls for more	P
But while the eons wax and wane	G
He storms the barricaded door	P
	-
Wisdom and peace and fair intent	K
Are tedious as a tale twice told	Q
One thing increases being spent	K
Perennial youth belongs to gold	Q
	-
At Weehawken the soul set free	A
Rules the high realm of Bunker Hill	R
Drink life from that philosophy	A
And flourish by the age's will	R
	-
If he shall toil to clear the field	S
Fate's children seize the prosperous year	T
Boldly he fashions some new shield	S
And naked feels the victor's spear	T
	-
He rolls the world up into day	E
He finds the grain and gets the hull	U
He sees his own mind in the sway	E
And Progress tiptoes on his skull	U
	-
Angels and fiends behold the wrong	V
And execrate his losing fight	W
While Jove amidst the choral song	V
Smiles and the heavens glow with light	W
	-
Trueblood	X
	-
	-
	-
Trueblood is bewitched to write a drama	Y
Only one drama then to die Enough	Z
To win the heights but once He writes me letters	A2
These later days marked Opened by the Censor	B2
About his drama asks me what I think	C2
About this point of view and that approach	D2
And whether to etch in his hero's soul	E2
By etching in his hero's enemies	F2
Or luminate his hero by enshadowing	C2
His hero's enemies How shall I tell him	G2
Which is the actual and the larger theme	H2
His hero or his hero's enemies	F2
And through it all I see that Trueblood's mind	I2
Runs to the under dog the fallen Titan	J2
The god misunderstood the lover of man	K2
Destroyed by heaven for his love of man	K2
In July while in London	J2
He took me to his house to dine and showed me	A
The verses as above And while I read	L2
He left the room returned I heard him move	M2
The ash trays on the table where we sat	N2
And set some object on the table	U
	-
Then	O2
As I looked up from reading I discovered	P2
A skull and bony hand upon the table	U
And Trueblood said Look at the loft brow	Q2
And what a hand was this A right hand too	O
Those fingers in the flesh did miracles	R2
And when I have my hero's skull before me	A
His hand that moulded peoples I should write	W
The drama that possesses all my thought	S2
You'd think the spirit of the man would come	T2
And show me how to find the key that fits	U2
The story of his life reveal its secret	V2
I know the secrets but I want the secret	V2
You'd think his spirit out of gratitude	W2
Would start me off It's something I insist	X2
To find a haven with a dramatist	X2
After your bones have crossed the sea and after	B2
Passing from hand to hand they reach seclusion	J2
And reverent housing	C2
	-
Dying in New York	C2
He lay for ten years in a lonely grave	Y2
Somewhere along the Hudson I believe	Z2
No grave yard in the city would receive him	G2
Neither a banker nor a friend of banks	A3
Nor falling in a duel to awake	C2
Indignant sorrow space in Trinity	A
Was not so much as offered He was poor	B3
And never had a tomb like Washington	J2
Of course he wasn't Washington but still	R
Study that skull a little In ten years	C3
A mad admirer living here in England	D3
Went to America and dug him up	E3
And brought his bones to Liverpool Just then	O2
Our country was in turmoil over France	F3
The details are so rich I lose my head	L2
And can't construct my acts hell's flaming here	G3
And we are fighting back the roaring fire	B2
That France had lighted England would abort	H3
The era she embraced Here is a point	I3
That vexes me in laying out the scenes	J3
And persons of the play For parliament	I
Went into fury that these bones were here	G3
On British soil The city raged They took	C2
The poor town crier gave him nine months' prison	J2
For crying on the streets the bones' arrival	U
I'd like to put that crier in my play	E
The scene of his arrest would thrill in case	J
I put it on a background understood	K3
And showing why the fellow was arrested	X
And what a high offence to heaven it was	L3
Then here's another thing The monument	I
This zealous friend had planned was never raised	M3
The city wouldn't have it you can guess	N3
The brain that filled this skull and moved this hand	L
Had given England trouble Yes believe me	A
He roused rebellion and he scattered pamphlets	O3
He had the English gift of writing pamphlets	O3
He stirred up peoples with his English gift	P3
Against the mother country How to show this	Q3
In action not in talk is difficult	R3
	-
Well then here is our friend who has these bones	S3
And cannot honor them in burial	U
And so he keeps them then becomes a bankrupt	T3
And look the bones pass to our friend's receiver	B2
Are they an asset Our Lord Chancellor	B2
Does not regard them so I'd like to work	C2
Some humor in my drama at this point	I3
And satirize his lordship just a little	U
Though you can scarcely call a skull an asset	U3
If it be of a man who helped to cost you	O
The loss of half the world So the receiver	B2
Cast out the bones and for a time a laborer	B2
Took care of them He sold them to a man	K2
Who dealt in furniture The empty coffin	F
About this time turned up in Guilford then	O2
It's the man is dead	L2
Near forty years when just the skull and hand	L
Are owned by Rev Ainslie who evades	V3
All questions touching on that ownership	W3
And where the ribs spine arms and thigh bones are	X3
The rest in short	H3
	-
And as for me no matter	B2
Who sold them gave them to me loaned them to me	A
Behold the good right hand behold the skull	U
Of Thomas Paine theo philanthropist	Y3
Of Quaker parents born in England Look	C2
That is the hand that wrote the Crisis wrote	Z3
The Age of Reason Common Sense and rallied	A4
Americans against the mother country	A
With just that English gift of pamphleteering	C2
You see I'd have to bring George Washington	J2
And James Monroe and Thomas Jefferson	J2
Upon the stage and put into their mouths	B4
The eulogies they spoke on Thomas Paine	G
To get before the audience that they thought	S2
He did as much as any man to win	F
Your independence that your Declaration	J2
Was founded on his writings even inspired	P2
A clause against your negro slavery how	Q2
Look at this hand he was the first to write	W
United States of America there's the hand	L
That was the first to write those words Good Lord	C4
This drama would out last a Chinese drama	Y
If I put all the story in But tell me	A
What to omit and what to stress	N3
	-
And still	R
I'd have the greatest drama in the world	D4
If I could prove he was dishonored hunted	X
Neglected libeled buried like a beast	E4
His bones dug up thrown in and out of Chancery	A
And show these horrors overtook Tom Paine	G
Because he was too great and by this showing	C2
Instruct the world to honor its torch bearers	A2
For time to come No Well that can't be done	J2
I know that but it puzzles me to think	C2
That Hamilton we'll say is so revered	F4
So lauded toasted all his papers studied	A4
On tariffs and on banks evoking ahs	L3
Great genius and so forth and there's the Crisis	G4
And Common Sense which only little Shelleys	G4
Haunting the dusty book shops read at all	H4
It wasn't that he liked his rum and drank	C2
Too much at times or chased a pretty skirt	I4
For Hamilton did that Paine never mixed	J4
In money matters to another's wrong	C2
For his sake or a system's Yes I know	K4
The world cares more for chastity and temperance	G4
Than for a faultless life in money matters	G4
No use to dramatize that vital contrast	L4
The world to day is what it always was	G4
But you don't call this Hamilton an artist	Y3
And Paine a mere logician and a wrangler	B2
Your artist soul gets limed in this mad world	D4
As much as any There is Leonardo	K4
The point's not here	G3
	-
I think it's more like this	G4
Some men are Titans and some men are gods	G4
And some are gods who fall while climbing back	C2
Up to Olympus whence they came And some	T2
While fighting for the race fall into holes	G4
Where to return and rescue them is death	M4
Why look you here You'd think America	Y
Had gone to war to cheat the guillotine	N4
Of Thomas Paine in fiery gratitude	W2
He's there in France's national assembly	A
And votes to save King Louis with this phrase	G4
Don't kill the man but kill the kingly office	G4
They think him faithless to the revolution	J2
For words like these and clap the prison door	P
Shuts on our Thomas So he writes a letter	B2
To president of what to Washington	J2
President of the United States of America	Y
A title which Paine coined in seventy seven	J2
Now lettered on a monstrous seal of state	O4
And Washington is silent never answers	G4
And leaves our Thomas shivering in a cell	P4
Who hears the guillotine go slash and click	C2
Perhaps this is the nucleus of my drama	Y
Or else to show that Washington was wise	G4
Respecting England's hatred of our Thomas	G4
And wise to lift no finger to save Thomas	G4
Incurring England's wrath who hated Thomas	G4
For pamphlets like the Crisis Common Sense	G4
That may be just the story for my drama	Y
Old Homer satirized the human race	G4
For warring for the rescue of a Cyprian	J2
But there's not stuff for satire in a war	P
Ensuing on the insult for the rescue	C2
Of nothing but a fellow who wrote pamphlets	G4
And won a continent for the rescuer	B2
That's tragedy the more so if the fellow	K4
Likes rum and writes that Jesus was a man	K2
This crushing of poor Thomas in the hate	O4
Of England and her power America's	G4
Great fear and lowered strength might make a drama	Y
As showing how the more you do in life	Q4
The greater shall you suffer This is true	C2
If what you battered down gets hold of you	C2
This drama almost drives me mad at times	G4
I have his story at my fingers' ends	G4
But it won't take a shape It flies my hands	G4
I think I'll have to give it up What's that	N2
Well if an audience of to day would turn	R4
From seeing Thomas Paine upon the stage	S4
What is the use to write it if they'd turn	R4
No matter how you wrote it I believe	Z2
They wouldn't like it in America	Y
Nor England either maybe you are right	W
A drama with no audience is a failure	B2
But here's this skull What shall I do with it	T4
If I should have it cased in solid silver	B2
There is no shrine to take it no Cologne	U4
For skulls like this	G4
	-
Well I must die sometime	V4
And who will get it then Look at this skull	U
This bony hand Then look at me my friend	W4
A man who has a theme the world despises	G4