Victor Rafolski On Art Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFFAGHIJKKLMN OPQRSTUVW XYPZA2B2SC2D2E2F2G2H 2H2I2J2J2O K2L2H2OJ2J2J2M2J2N2O 2P2GIQ2GR2S2 T2J2J2U2U2JV2W2U2X2U 2QU2U2Y2W2J2U2Z2G A3P2J2F2J2J2U2JJ2B3B 3G U2P2H2C3D3E3U2U2C3C3 T2XT2QGJ2J2ZU2F3JU2J 2 U2U2X2JJ2J2U2A3G3J2G FF2J2F U2U2U2J2J2U2GGJ2H3U2 FF2GI3E3U2FJ3G K3J2GGJ2U2L3J2J2HGJ2 J2GJ2J2U2Q2GU2M3U2J2 J2X2J2N3O3 J2P3P3GIFT2 FU2IJ2QY2U2U2U2U2Q2U 2U2U2N3PGU2GJ2J2Q3FF R3P3 F

You dull Goliaths clothed in coats of blueA
Strained and half bursted by the swell of fleshB
Topped by Gorilla heads You MarmosetC
Trained scoundrel taught to question and ensnareD
I hate you hate your laws and hate your courtsE
Hands off give me a chair now let me beF
I'll tell you more than you can think to ask meF
I love this woman but what is love to youA
What is it to your laws or courts I love herG
She loves me if you'd know I entered her roomH
She stood before me naked shrank a littleI
Cried out a little calmed her sudden cryJ
When she saw amiable passion in my eyesK
She loves me if you'd know I saw in her eyesK
More in those moments than whole hours of talkL
From witness stands exculpate could make clearM
My innocenceN
-
But if I did a crimeO
My excuse is hunger hunger for more lifeP
Oh what a world where beauty rapture loveQ
Are walled in and locked up like coal or foodR
And only may he had by purchasersS
From whose fat fingers slip the unheeded goldT
Oh what a world where beauty lies in wasteU
While power and freedom skulk with famished lipsV
Too tightly pressed for cursesW
-
So do menX
Save for the thousandth man deny themselvesY
And live in meagreness to make sure a lifeP
Of meagreness by hearth stones long since staleZ
And live in ways companionships as fixedA2
As the geared figures of the Strassburg clockB2
You wonder at war Why war lets loose desiresS
Emotions long repressed Would you stop warC2
Then let men live The moral equivalentD2
Of war is freedom Art does not sufficeE2
Religion is not life but life is livingF2
And painted cherries to the hungry thrushG2
Is art to life The artist lived his workH2
You cannot live his life who love his workH2
You are the thrush that pecks at painted cherriesI2
Who hope to live through art Beer soaked GoliathsJ2
The story's coming of her nakednessJ2
Be patient for a timeO
-
All this I learnedK2
While painting pictures no one ever boughtL2
Till hunger drove me to this servile workH2
As butler in her father's house with timeO
On certain days to walk the galleriesJ2
And look at pictures marbles For I sawJ2
I was not living while I painted picturesJ2
I was not living working for a crustM2
I was not living walking galleriesJ2
All this was but vicarious life which feltN2
Through gazing at the thing the artist madeO2
In memory of the life he lived himselfP2
As we preserve the fragrance of a flowerG
By drawing off its essence in a bottleI
Where color fluttering leaves are thrown awayQ2
To get the inner passion of the flowerG
Extracted to a bottle that a queenR2
May act the flower's partS2
-
Say what you willT2
Make laws to strangle life shout from your pulpitsJ2
Your desks of editors your woolsack benchesJ2
Where judges sit that this dull hypocriteU2
You call the State has fashioned life arightU2
The secret is abroad from eye to eyeJ
The secret passes from poor eyes that winkV2
In boredom in fatigue in furious strengthW2
Roped down or barred that what the human heartU2
Dreams of and hopes for till the aspiring flameX2
Flaps in the guttered candle and goes outU2
Is love for body and for spirit loveQ
To satisfy their hunger Yet what is itU2
This earth this life what is it but a meadowU2
Where spirits are left free a little whileY2
Within a little space so long as strengthW2
Flesh blood increases to the day of useJ2
As roasts or stews wherewith this witless beastU2
Society may feed himself and keepZ2
His olden shape and powerG
-
Fools go cropA3
The herbs they turn you to and starve yourselfP2
For what you want and count it righteousnessJ2
No less you covet love Poor shadows sighingF2
Across the curtain racing Mangled soulsJ2
Pecking so feebly at the painted cherriesJ2
Inhaling from a bottle what was livedU2
These summers gone You know and scarce denyJ
That what we men desire are horses dogsJ2
Loves women insurrections travel changeB3
Thrill in the wreck and rapture for the changeB3
And re adjusted orderG
-
As I turnedU2
From painting and from art yet found myselfP2
Full of all lusts while bound to menial workH2
Where my eyes daily rested on this womanC3
A thought came to me like a little sparkD3
One sees far down the darkness of a caveE3
Which grows into a flame a blinding lightU2
As one approaches it so did this thoughtU2
Both burn and blind me For I loved this womanC3
I wanted her why should I lose this womanC3
What was there to oppose possession WillT2
Her will you say I am not sure but thenX
Which will is better mine or hers Which willT2
Deserves achievement Which has rights aboveQ
The other I desire her her desireG
Is not toward me which of these two desiresJ2
Shall triumph Why not mine for me and hersJ2
For her at least the stronger must prevailZ
And wreck itself or bend all else before itU2
That millionaire who wooed her tried in vainF3
To overwhelm her will with gold and IJ
With passion boldness would have overwhelmed itU2
And what's the differenceJ2
-
But as I saidU2
I walked the galleries When I stood in the yardU2
Bare armed bare throated at my work she cameX2
And gazed upon me from her window IJ
Could feel the exhausting influence of her eyesJ2
Then in a concentration which was blindnessJ2
To all else so bewilderment of mindU2
I'd go to see Watteau's AntiopeA3
Where he sketched Zeus in hunger drawing backG3
The veil that hid her sleeping nakednessJ2
There was Correggio's too on whom a satyrG
Smiled for his amorous wonder A SemeleF
Done by an unknown hand a thing of lightningF2
Moved through by Zeus who seized her as the flamesJ2
Consumed her ravished beautyF
-
So I lookedU2
And trembled then returned perhaps to findU2
Her eyes upon me conscious calm elateU2
And radiate with lashes of surpriseJ2
Delight as when a star is still but shinesJ2
And on this night somehow our natures workedU2
To climaxes For first she dressed for dinnerG
To show more back and bosom than beforeG
And as I served her her down looking eyesJ2
Were more than glances Then she dropped her napkinH3
Before I could begin to bend she leanedU2
And let me see oh yes she let me seeF
The white foam of her little breasts caressingF2
The scarlet flame of silk a swooning shoreG
Of bright carnations It was from such foamI3
That Venus rose And as I stooped and gaveE3
The napkin to her she pushed out a footU2
And then I coughed for breath grown short and sheF
Concealed a smile and you you jailers laughJ3
Coarse mouthed and mock my hungerG
-
I go onK3
Observe how courage boldness mark my stepsJ2
At nine o'clock she climbs to her boudoirG
I finding errands in the hallway hearG
The desultory taking up of booksJ2
And through her open door see her at lastU2
Cast off her dinner gown and to the bathL3
Step like a ray of moonlight Then she snapsJ2
The light on where the onyx tub and wallsJ2
Dazzle the air I enter then her roomH
And stand against the closed door do not pryG
Upon her in the bath Give her the chanceJ2
To fly me fight me standing face to faceJ2
I hear her flounder in the water hearG
Hands slap and slip with water breast and armsJ2
Hear little sighs and shudders and the roughnessJ2
Of crash towels on her back when in a minuteU2
She stands with back toward me in the doorwayQ2
A sea shell glory pink and white to hairG
Sun lit a lily crowned with powdered goldU2
She turned toward her dresser then and shookM3
White dust of talcum on her arms and lookedU2
So lovingly upon her tense straight breastsJ2
Touching them under with soft tapering handsJ2
To blue eyes deepening like a brazier flameX2
Turned by a sudden gust Who gives her theseJ2
The thought ran through me for her joy aloneN3
And not for mineO3
-
So I stood there like ZeusJ2
Coming in thunder to Semele likeP3
The diety of Watteau CorreggioP3
Had never painted me a satyr thereG
Drinking her beauty in so worshipfulI
My will subdued in worship of her beautyF
To obey her willT2
-
And then she turned and saw meF
And faced me in her nakedness nor triedU2
To hide it from me faced me immovableI
A Mona Lisa smile upon her lipsJ2
And let me plead my cause make known my loveQ
Speak out my torture wearing still the smileY2
Let me approach her till I almost touchedU2
The whiteness of her bosom Then it seemedU2
That smile of hers not wilting me she clappedU2
Hands over eyes and said I am afraidU2
Oh no it cannot be what would they sayQ2
Then rushing in the bathroom quick she slammedU2
The door and shrieked You scoundrel go you beastU2
My dream went up like paper charred and whirledU2
Above a hearth Thrilling I stood aloneN3
Amid her room and saw my life our lifeP
Embodied in this woman lately thereG
Lying and cowardly And as I turnedU2
To leave the room her father and the gardenerG
Pounced on me threw me down a flight of stairsJ2
And turned me over stunned to you the lawJ2
Here with these others who have stolen coalQ3
To keep them warm as I have stolen beautyF
To keep from freezing in this arid countryF
Of winter winds on which the dust of customR3
Rides like a fogP3
-
Now do your worst to meF

Edgar Lee Masters



Rate:
(1)



Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme

Submit Spanish Translation
Submit German Translation
Submit French Translation


Write your comment about Victor Rafolski On Art poem by Edgar Lee Masters


 

Recent Interactions*

This poem was read 0 times,

This poem was added to the favorite list by 0 members,

This poem was voted by 0 members.

(* Interactions only in the last 7 days)

New Poems

Popular Poets