All Souls Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BBCCBBBB A DDEEFGBB A HHIIJJBB BBKKBBBB BBLLBBBB BBMMBB JJNNBBMMI | A |
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A thin moon faints in the sky o'erhead | B |
And dumb in the churchyard lie the dead | B |
Walk we not Sweet by garden ways | C |
Where the late rose hangs and the phlox delays | C |
But forth of the gate and down the road | B |
Past the church and the yews to their dim abode | B |
For it's turn of the year and All Souls' night | B |
When the dead can hear and the dead have sight | B |
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II | A |
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Fear not that sound like wind in the trees | D |
It is only their call that comes on the breeze | D |
Fear not the shudder that seems to pass | E |
It is only the tread of their feet on the grass | E |
Fear not the drip of the bough as you stoop | F |
It is only the touch of their hands that grope | G |
For the year's on the turn and it's All Souls' night | B |
When the dead can yearn and the dead can smite | B |
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III | A |
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And where should a man bring his sweet to woo | H |
But here where such hundreds were lovers too | H |
Where lie the dead lips that thirst to kiss | I |
The empty hands that their fellows miss | I |
Where the maid and her lover from sere to green | J |
Sleep bed by bed with the worm between | J |
For it's turn of the year and All Souls' night | B |
When the dead can hear and the dead have sight | B |
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IV | - |
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And now they rise and walk in the cold | B |
Let us warm their blood and give youth to the old | B |
Let them see us and hear us and say Ah thus | K |
In the prime of the year it went with us | K |
Till their lips drawn close and so long unkist | B |
Forget they are mist that mingles with mist | B |
For the year's on the turn and it's All Souls' night | B |
When the dead can burn and the dead can smite | B |
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V | - |
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Till they say as they hear us poor dead poor dead | B |
Just an hour of this and our age long bed | B |
Just a thrill of the old remembered pains | L |
To kindle a flame in our frozen veins | L |
A touch and a sight and a floating apart | B |
As the chill of dawn strikes each phantom heart | B |
For it's turn of the year and All Souls' night | B |
When the dead can hear and the dead have sight | B |
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VI | - |
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And where should the living feel alive | - |
But here in this wan white humming hive | - |
As the moon wastes down and the dawn turns cold | B |
And one by one they creep back to the fold | B |
And where should a man hold his mate and say | M |
One more one more ere we go their way | M |
For the year's on the turn and it's All Souls' night | B |
When the living can learn by the churchyard light | B |
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VII | - |
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And how should we break faith who have seen | J |
Those dead lips plight with the mist between | J |
And how forget who have seen how soon | N |
They lie thus chambered and cold to the moon | N |
How scorn how hate how strive wee too | B |
Who must do so soon as those others do | B |
For it's All Souls' night and break of the day | M |
And behold with the light the dead are away | M |
Edith Wharton
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