Lancelot 04 Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCCDEFGHIJKLGMGN OGPQEEGORQQEQESTULVW XVCEYVCC ZCA2VCVEVGVGB2CC2VVD 2GE2F2EG2EH2KLVI2VJ2 K2PC2VEEL2G2 VL2M2VVVVEN2VVO2O2EC W P2Q2WEBVVR2R2S2T2U2C EVEV2W2VVLE CVEQ2ECEX2EVCVGY2F2E GLZ2VCI2WGWCCZ2A3B3C 3WBVO2CED3VWEP2E3F3W CCGV PWEVBEEO2G3E2XBCEH3K I3CCVVVVE3J3VCWSI2LZ 2CVCK3VS2L3VM3EVCO2C VWEI2N3VE2| Not having viewed Carleon or Carlisle | A |
| The King came home to Camelot after midnight | B |
| Feigning an ill not feigned and his return | C |
| Brought Bedivere and after him Gawaine | C |
| To the King's inner chamber where they waited | D |
| Through the grim light of dawn Sir Bedivere | E |
| By nature stern to see though not so bleak | F |
| Within as to be frozen out of mercy | G |
| Sat with arms crossed and with his head weighed low | H |
| In heavy meditation Once or twice | I |
| His eyes were lifted for a careful glimpse | J |
| Of Gawaine at the window where he stood | K |
| Twisting his fingers feverishly behind him | L |
| Like one distinguishing indignantly | G |
| For swift eclipse and for offence not his | M |
| The towers and roofs and the sad majesty | G |
| Of Camelot in the dawn for the last time | N |
| - | |
| Sir Bedivere at last with a long sigh | O |
| That said less of his pain than of his pity | G |
| Addressed the younger knight who turned and heard | P |
| His elder but with no large eagerness | Q |
| So it has come Gawaine and we are here | E |
| I find when I see backward something farther | E |
| By grace of time than you are given to see | G |
| Though you past any doubt see much that I | O |
| See not I find that what the colder speech | R |
| Of reason most repeated says to us | Q |
| Of what is in a way to come to us | Q |
| Is like enough to come And we are here | E |
| Before the unseeing sun is here to mock us | Q |
| Or the King here to prove us we are here | E |
| We are the two it seems that are to make | S |
| Of words and of our presences a veil | T |
| Between him and the sight of what he does | U |
| Little have I to say that I may tell him | L |
| For what I know is what the city knows | V |
| Not what it says for it says everything | W |
| The city says the first of all who met | X |
| The sword of Lancelot was Colgrevance | V |
| Who fell dead while he wept a brave machine | C |
| Cranked only for the rudiments of war | E |
| But some of us are born to serve and shift | Y |
| And that's not well The city says also | V |
| That you and Lancelot were in the garden | C |
| Before the sun went down | C |
| - | |
| Yes Gawaine groaned | Z |
| Yes we were there together in the garden | C |
| Before the sun went down and I conceive | A2 |
| A place among the possibilities | V |
| For me with other causes unforeseen | C |
| Of what may shake down soon to grief and ashes | V |
| This kingdom and this empire Bedivere | E |
| Could I have given a decent seriousness | V |
| To Lancelot while he said things to me | G |
| That pulled his heart half out of him by the roots | V |
| And left him I see now half sick with pity | G |
| For my poor uselessness to serve a need | B2 |
| That I had never known we might be now | C |
| Asleep and easy in our beds at home | C2 |
| And we might hear no murmurs after sunrise | V |
| Of what we are to hear A few right words | V |
| Of mine if said well might have been enough | D2 |
| That shall I never know I shall know only | G |
| That it was I who laughed at Lancelot | E2 |
| When he said what lay heaviest on his heart | F2 |
| By now he might be far away from here | E |
| And farther from the world But the Queen came | G2 |
| The Queen came and I left them there together | E |
| And I laughed as I left them After dark | H2 |
| I met with Modred and said what I could | K |
| When I had heard him to discourage him | L |
| His mother was my mother I told Bors | V |
| And he told Lancelot though as for that | I2 |
| My story would have been the same as his | V |
| And would have had the same acknowledgement | J2 |
| Thanks but no matter' or to that effect | K2 |
| The Queen of course had fished him for his word | P |
| And had it on the hook when she went home | C2 |
| And after that an army of red devils | V |
| Could not have held the man away from her | E |
| And I'm to live as long as I'm to wonder | E |
| What might have been had I not been myself | L2 |
| I heard him and I laughed Then the Queen came | G2 |
| - | |
| Recriminations are not remedies | V |
| Gawaine and though you cast them at yourself | L2 |
| And hurt yourself you cannot end or swerve | M2 |
| The flowing of these minutes that leave hours | V |
| Behind us as we leave our faded selves | V |
| And yesterdays The surest visioned of us | V |
| Are creatures of our dreams and inferences | V |
| And though it look to us a few go far | E |
| For seeing far the fewest and the farthest | N2 |
| Of all we know go not beyond themselves | V |
| No Gawaine you are not the cause of this | V |
| And I have many doubts if all you said | O2 |
| Or in your lightness may have left unsaid | O2 |
| Would have unarmed the Queen The Queen was there | E |
| Gawaine looked up and then looked down again | C |
| Good God if I had only said said something | W |
| - | |
| Say nothing now Gawaine Bedivere sighed | P2 |
| And shook his head Morning is not in the west | Q2 |
| The sun is rising and the King is coming | W |
| Now you may hear him in the corridor | E |
| Like a sick landlord shuffling to the light | B |
| For one last look out on his mortgaged hills | V |
| But hills and valleys are not what he sees | V |
| He sees with us the fire the sign the law | R2 |
| The King that is the father of the law | R2 |
| Is weaker than his child except he slay it | S2 |
| Not long ago Gawaine I had a dream | T2 |
| Of a sword over kings and of a world | U2 |
| Without them Dreams dreams Hush Gawaine | C |
| - | |
| King Arthur | E |
| Came slowly on till in the darkened entrance | V |
| He stared and shivered like a sleep walker | E |
| Brought suddenly awake where a cliff's edge | V2 |
| Is all he sees between another step | W2 |
| And his annihilation Bedivere rose | V |
| And Gawaine rose and with instinctive arms | V |
| They partly guided partly carried him | L |
| To the King's chair | E |
| - | |
| I thank you gentlemen | C |
| Though I am not so shaken I dare say | V |
| As you would have me This is not the hour | E |
| When kings who do not sleep are at their best | Q2 |
| And had I slept this night that now is over | E |
| No man should ever call me King again | C |
| He pulled his heavy robe around him closer | E |
| And laid upon his forehead a cold hand | X2 |
| That came down warm and wet You Bedivere | E |
| And you Gawaine are shaken with events | V |
| Incredible yesterday but kings are men | C |
| Take off their crowns and tear away their colors | V |
| And let them see with my eyes what I see | G |
| Yes they are men indeed If there's a slave | Y2 |
| In Britain with a reptile at his heart | F2 |
| Like mine that with his claws of ice and fire | E |
| Tears out of me the fevered roots of mercy | G |
| Find him and I will make a king of him | L |
| And then so that his happiness may swell | Z2 |
| Tenfold I'll sift the beauty of all courts | V |
| And capitals to fetch the fairest woman | C |
| That evil has in hiding after that | I2 |
| That he may know the sovran one man living | W |
| To be his friend I'll prune all chivalry | G |
| To one sure knight In this wise our new king | W |
| Will have his queen to love as I had mine | C |
| His friend that he may trust as I had mine | C |
| And he will be as gay if all goes well | Z2 |
| As I have been as fortunate in his love | A3 |
| And in his friend as fortunate as I am | B3 |
| And what am I And what are you you two | C3 |
| If you are men why don't you say I'm dreaming | W |
| I know men when I see them I know daylight | B |
| And I see now the gray shine of our dreams | V |
| I tell you I'm asleep and in my bed | O2 |
| But no no I remember You are men | C |
| You are no dreams but God God if you were | E |
| If I were strong enough to make you vanish | D3 |
| And have you back again with yesterday | V |
| Before I lent myself to that false hunting | W |
| Which yet may stalk the hours of many more | E |
| Than Lancelot's unhappy twelve who died | P2 |
| With a misguided Colgrevance to lead them | E3 |
| And Agravaine to follow and fall next | F3 |
| Then should I know at last that I was King | W |
| And I should then be King But kings are men | C |
| And I have gleaned enough these two years gone | C |
| To know that queens are women Merlin told me | G |
| The love that never was ' Two years ago | V |
| He told me that The love that never was ' | - |
| I saw but I saw nothing Like the bird | P |
| That hides his head I made myself see nothing | W |
| But yesterday I saw and I saw fire | E |
| I think I saw it first in Modred's eyes | V |
| Yet he said only truth and fire is right | B |
| It is it must be fire The law says fire | E |
| And I the King who made the law say fire | E |
| What have I done what folly have I said | O2 |
| Since I came here of dreaming Dreaming Ha | G3 |
| I wonder if the Queen and Lancelot | E2 |
| Are dreaming Lancelot Have they found him yet | X |
| He slashed a way into the outer night | B |
| Somewhere with Bors We'll have him here anon | C |
| And we shall feed him also to the fire | E |
| There are too many faggots lying cold | H3 |
| That might as well be cleansing for our good | K |
| A few deferred infections of our state | I3 |
| That honor should no longer look upon | C |
| Thank heaven I man my drifting wits again | C |
| Gawaine your brothers Gareth and Gaheris | V |
| Are by our royal order there to see | V |
| And to report They went unwillingly | V |
| For they are new to law and young to justice | V |
| But what they are to see will harden them | E3 |
| With wholesome admiration of a realm | J3 |
| Where treason's end is ashes Ashes Ashes | V |
| Now this is better I am King again | C |
| Forget I pray my drowsy temporizing | W |
| For I was not then properly awake | S |
| What Hark Whose crass insanity is that | I2 |
| If I be King go find the fellow and hang him | L |
| Who beats into the morning on that bell | Z2 |
| Before there is a morning This is dawn | C |
| What Bedivere Gawaine You shake your heads | V |
| I tell you this is dawn What have I done | C |
| What have I said so lately that I flinch | K3 |
| To think on What have I sent those boys to see | V |
| I'll put clouts on my eyes and I'll not see it | S2 |
| Her face and hands and little small white feet | L3 |
| And all her shining hair and her warm body | V |
| No for the love of God no it's alive | M3 |
| She's all alive and they are burning her | E |
| The Queen the love the love that never was | V |
| Gawaine Bedivere Gawaine Where is Gawaine | C |
| Is he there in the shadow Is he dead | O2 |
| Are we all dead Are we in hell Gawaine | C |
| I cannot see her now in the smoke Her eyes | V |
| Are what I see and her white body is burning | W |
| She never did enough to make me see her | E |
| Like that to make her look at me like that | I2 |
| There's not room in the world for so much evil | N3 |
| As I see clamoring in her poor white face | V |
| For pity Pity her God God Lancelot | E2 |
Edwin Arlington Robinson
(1)
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About Lancelot 04
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