Artemis To Actaeon Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSG TUVO WXYZA2B2XC2D2NNE2F2M G2CNCCCOH2CNNI2NGNCC J2NCCNNNCRQE2 ME2K2MCMNL2NM2CK2NK2 N2NO2CYCCP2Q2 CKR2COThou couldst not look on me and live so runs | A |
The mortal legend thou that couldst not live | B |
Nor look on me so the divine decree | C |
That saw'st me in the cloud the wave the bough | D |
The clod commoved with April and the shapes | E |
Lurking 'twixt lid and eye ball in the dark | F |
Mocked I thee not in every guise of life | G |
Hid in girls' eyes a naiad in her well | H |
Wooed through their laughter and like echo fled | I |
Luring thee down the primal silences | J |
Where the heart hushes and the flesh is dumb | K |
Nay was not I the tide that drew thee out | L |
Relentlessly from the detaining shore | M |
Forth from the home lights and the hailing voices | N |
Forth from the last faint headland's failing line | O |
Till I enveloped thee from verge to verge | P |
And hid thee in the hollow of my being | Q |
And still because between us hung the veil | R |
The myriad tinted veil of sense thy feet | S |
Refused their rest thy hands the gifts of life | G |
Thy heart its losses lest some lesser face | T |
Should blur mine image in thine upturned soul | U |
Ere death had stamped it there This was thy thought | V |
And mine | O |
- | |
The gods they say have all not so | W |
This have they flocks on every hill the blue | X |
Spirals of incense and the amber drip | Y |
Of lucid honey comb on sylvan shrines | Z |
First chosen weanlings doves immaculate | A2 |
Twin cooing in the osier plaited cage | B2 |
And ivy garlands glaucous with the dew | X |
Man's wealth man's servitude but not himself | C2 |
And so they pale for lack of warmth they wane | D2 |
Freeze to the marble of their images | N |
And pinnacled on man's subserviency | N |
Through the thick sacrificial haze discern | E2 |
Unheeding lives and loves as some cold peak | F2 |
Through icy mists may enviously descry | M |
Warm vales unzoned to the all fruitful sun | G2 |
So they along an immortality | C |
Of endless envistaed homage strain their gaze | N |
If haply some rash votary empty urned | C |
But light of foot with all adventuring hand | C |
Break rank fling past the people and the priest | C |
Up the last step on to the inmost shrine | O |
And there the sacred curtain in his clutch | H2 |
Drop dead of seeing while the others prayed | C |
Yes this we wait for this renews us this | N |
Incarnates us pale people of your dreams | N |
Who are but what you make us wood or stone | I2 |
Or cold chryselephantine hung with gems | N |
Or else the beating purpose of your life | G |
Your sword your clay the note your pipe pursues | N |
The face that haunts your pillow or the light | C |
Scarce visible over leagues of labouring sea | C |
O thus through use to reign again to drink | J2 |
The cup of peradventure to the lees | N |
For one dear instant disimmortalised | C |
In giving immortality | C |
So dream the gods upon their listless thrones | N |
Yet sometimes when the votary appears | N |
With death affronting forehead and glad eyes | N |
Too young they rather muse too frail thou art | C |
And shall we rob some girl of saffron veil | R |
And nuptial garland for so slight a thing | Q |
And so to their incurious loves return | E2 |
- | |
Not so with thee for some indeed there are | M |
Who would behold the truth and then return | E2 |
To pine among the semblances but I | K2 |
Divined in thee the questing foot that never | M |
Revisits the cold hearth of yesterday | C |
Or calls achievement home I from afar | M |
Beheld thee fashioned for one hour's high use | N |
Nor meant to slake oblivion drop by drop | L2 |
Long long hadst thou inhabited my dreams | N |
Surprising me as harts surprise a pool | M2 |
Stealing to drink at midnight I divined | C |
Thee rash to reach the heart of life and lie | K2 |
Bosom to bosom in occasion's arms | N |
And said Because I love thee thou shalt die | K2 |
- | |
For immortality is not to range | N2 |
Unlimited through vast Olympian days | N |
Or sit in dull dominion over time | O2 |
But this to drink fate's utmost at a draught | C |
Nor feel the wine grow stale upon the lip | Y |
To scale the summit of some soaring moment | C |
Nor know the dulness of the long descent | C |
To snatch the crown of life and seal it up | P2 |
Secure forever in the vaults of death | Q2 |
- | |
And this was thine to lose thyself in me | C |
Relive in my renewal and become | K |
The light of other lives a quenchless torch | R2 |
Passed on from hand to hand till men are dust | C |
And the last garland withers from my shrine | O |
Edith Wharton
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