The Moat House Poem Rhyme Scheme

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Edith Nesbit

The Moat House Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

About The Moat House

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PART I	A
	-
I	A
	-
UNDER the shade of convent towers	B
Where fast and vigil mark the hours	B
From childhood into youth there grew	C
A maid as fresh as April dew	C
And sweet as May's ideal flowers	B
	-
Brighter than dawn in wind swept skies	D
Like children's dreams most pure unwise	D
Yet with a slumbering soul fire too	C
That sometimes shone a moment through	C
Her wondrous unawakened eyes	D
	-
	-
The nuns who loved her coldly meant	E
The twig should grow as it was bent	E
That she like them should watch youth's bier	F
Should watch her day dreams disappear	G
And go the loveless way they went	E
	-
	-
The convent walls were high and grey	H
How could Love hope to find a way	H
Into that citadel forlorn	I
Where his dear name was put to scorn	I
Or called a sinful thing to say	H
	-
	-
Yet Love did come what need to tell	J
Of flowers downcast that sometimes fell	J
Across her feet when dreamily	J
She paced with unused breviary	H
Down paths made still with August's spell	J
	-
	-
Of looks cast through the chapel grate	K
Of letters helped by Love and Fate	K
That to cold fingers did not come	L
But lay within a warmer home	M
Upon her heart inviolate	N
	-
	-
Somehow he loved her she loved him	O
Then filled her soul's cup to the brim	O
And all her daily life grew bright	P
With such a flood of rosy light	P
As turned the altar candles dim	O
	-
	-
But love that lights is love that leads	Q
And lives upon the heart it feeds	Q
Soon grew she pale though not less fair	H
And sighed his name instead of prayer	H
And told her heart throbs not her beads	Q
	-
	-
How could she find the sunlight fair	H
A sunlight that he did not share	H
How could a rose smell sweet within	R
The cruel bars that shut her in	R
And shut him out while she was there	H
	-
	-
He vowed her fealty firm and fast	S
Then to the winds her fears she cast	S
They found a way to cheat the bars	T
And in free air beneath free stars	T
Free and with him she stood at last	S
	-
	-
'Now to some priest ' he said 'that he	U
May give thee blessing us to me '	-
'No priest ' she cried in doubt and fear	H
'He would divide not join us dear	H
I am mine I give myself to thee	U
	-
	-
'Since thou and I are mine and thine	V
What need to swear it at a shrine	V
Would love last longer if we swore	H
That we would love for evermore	H
God gives me thee and thou art mine '	-
	-
	-
'God weds us now ' he said 'yet still	J
Some day shall we all forms fulfil	J
Eternal truth affords to smile	J
At laws wherewith man marks his guile	J
Yet law shall join us when you will	J
	-
	-
'So look your last my love on these	W
Forbidding walls and wooing trees	W
Farewell to grief and gloom ' said he	U
'Farewell to childhood's joy ' said she	U
But neither said 'Farewell to peace '	-
	-
Song	X
	-
My sweet my sweet	Y
She is complete	Y
From dainty head to darling feet	Y
So warm and white	P
So brown and bright	P
So made for love and love's delight	P
	-
	-
God could but spare	H
One flower so fair	H
There is none like her anywhere	H
Beneath wide skies	D
The whole earth lies	D
But not two other such brown eyes	D
	-
	-
The world we're in	R
If one might win	R
Not worth that dimple in her chin	R
A heaven to know	Z
I'll let that go	Z
But once to see her lids droop low	Z
	-
	-
Over her eyes	D
By love made wise	D
To see her bosom fall and rise	D
Is more than worth	A2
The angels' mirth	A2
And all the heaven joys of earth	A2
	-
	-
This is the hour	H
Which gives me power	H
To win and wear earth's whitest flower	H
Oh Love give grace	B2
Through all life's ways	C2
Keep pure this heart her dwelling place	B2
	-
	-
II	A
	-
The fields were reaped and the pastures bare	H
And the nights grown windy and chill	J
When the lovers passed through the beech woods fair	H
And climbed the brow of the hill	J
In the hill's spread arm the Moat House lies	D
With elm and willow tree	U
'And is that your home at last ' she sighs	D
'Our home at last ' laughs he	U
	-
	-
Across the bridge and into the hall	J
Where the waiting housefolk were	H
'This is my lady ' he said to them all	J
And she looked so sweet and fair	H
That every maid and serving boy	D2
God blessed them then and there	H
And wished them luck and gave them joy	D2
For a happy handsome pair	H
	-
	-
And only the old nurse shook her head	E2
'Too young ' she said 'too young '	-
She noted that no prayers were read	E2
No marriage bells were rung	F2
No guests were called no feast was spread	E2
As was meet for a marriage tide	G2
The young lord in the banquet hall broke bread	E2
Alone with his little bride	G2
	-
	-
Yet her old heart warmed to the two and blessed	H2
They were both so glad and gay	H
By to morrow and yesterday unoppressed	H2
Fulfilled of the joy of to day	H2
Like two young birds in that dull old nest	H2
So careless of coming care	H
So rapt in the other that each possessed	H2
The two young lovers were	H
	-
	-
He was heir to a stern hard natured race	B2
That had held the Moat House long	X
But the gloom of his formal dwelling place	B2
Dissolved at her voice and song	X
So bright so sweet to the house she came	I2
So winning of way and word	H2
The household knew her by one pet name	I2
'My Lady Ladybird '	-
	-
	-
First love so rarely gets leave to bring	J2
In our world where money is might	H2
Its tender buds to blossoming	J2
With the sun of its own delight	H2
We love at rose or at vintage prime	K2
In the glare and heat of the day	H2
Forgetting the dawn and the violet time	K2
And the wild sweet scent of the may	H2
	-
	-
These loved like children like children played	H2
The old house laughed with delight	H2
At her song of a voice at the radiance made	H2
By her dress's flashing flight	H2
Up the dark oak stair through the gallery's gloom	L2
She ran like a fairy fleet	H2
And ever her lover from room to room	L2
Fast followed her flying feet	H2
	-
	-
They gathered the buds of the late lived rose	M2
In the ordered garden ways	C2
They walked through the sombre yew walled close	N2
And threaded the pine woods maze	C2
They rode through woods where their horses came	I2
Knee deep through the rustling leaves	O2
Through fields forlorn of the poppies' flame	I2
And bereft of their golden sheaves	O2
	-
	-
In the mellow hush of October noon	P2
They rowed in the flat broad boat	H2
Through the lily leaves so thickly strewn	P2
On the sunny side of the moat	H2
They were glad of the fire of the beech crowned hill	J
And glad of the pale deep sky	A
And the shifting shade that the willows made	H2
On the boat as she glided by	A
	-
	-
They roamed each room of the Moat House through	H
And questioned the wraiths of the past	H2
What legends rare the old dresses knew	H
And the swords what had wet them last	H2
What faces had looked through the lozenge panes	Q2
What shadows darkened the door	H
What feet had walked in the jewelled stains	Q2
That the rich glass cast on the floor	H
	-
	-
She dressed her beauty in old brocade	H2
That breathed of loss and regret	H2
In laces that broken hearts had swayed	H2
In the days when the swords were wet	H2
And the rubies and pearls laughed out and said	H2
'Though the lovers for whom we were set	H2
And the women who loved us have long been dead	H2
Yet beauty and we live yet '	-
	-
	-
When the wild white winter's spectral hand	H2
Effaced the green and the red	H2
And crushed the fingers brown of the land	H2
Till they grew death white instead	H2
The two found cheer in their dark oak room	L2
And their dreams of a coming spring	J2
For a brighter sun shone through winter's gloom	L2
Than ever a summer could bring	J2
	-
	-
They sat where the great fires blazed in the hall	J
Where the wolf skins lay outspread	H2
The pictured faces looked down from the wall	J
To hear his praise of the dead	H2
He told her ghostly tales of the past	H2
And legends rare of his house	R2
Till she held her breath at the shade fire cast	H2
And the scamper rush of the mouse	R2
	-
	-
Till she dared not turn her head to see	U
What shape might stand by her chair	H
Till she cried his name and fled to his knee	U
And safely nestled there	H
Then they talked of their journey the city's crowd	H2
Of the convent's faint joy and pain	S2
Till the ghosts of the past were laid in the shroud	H2
Of commonplace things again	T2
	-
	-
So the winter died and the baby spring	J2
With hardly voice for a cry	A
And hands too weak the signs to b	U