Bianca Among The Nightingales Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABABCDCDC EFEFGHGHC IJI CKCKC LMLMNONOC PCPCQRQRC STUTVWWWC XNXNWYWZC A2B2A2B2QCQCC WCWCWWWWC WOWOWC2WC2C WWWWQWD2WC E2D2E2D2CF2CF2C G2H2G2H2WWWWC CCCCI2WI2WC I2II2J2CE2CE2E2 E2K2E2K2WL2WL2E2The cypress stood up like a church | A |
That night we felt our love would hold | B |
And saintly moonlight seemed to search | A |
And wash the whole world clean as gold | B |
The olives crystallized the vales' | C |
Broad slopes until the hills grew strong | D |
The fireflies and the nightingales | C |
Throbbed each to either flame and song | D |
The nightingales the nightingales | C |
- | |
Upon the angle of its shade | E |
The cypress stood self balanced high | F |
Half up half down as double made | E |
Along the ground against the sky | F |
And we too from such soul height went | G |
Such leaps of blood so blindly driven | H |
We scarce knew if our nature meant | G |
Most passionate earth or intense heaven | H |
The nightingales the nightingales | C |
- | |
We paled with love we shook with love | I |
We kissed so close we could not vow | J |
Till Giulio whispered 'Sweet above | I |
God's Ever guarantees this Now ' | - |
And through his words the nightingales | C |
Drove straight and full their long clear call | K |
Like arrows through heroic mails | C |
And love was awful in it all | K |
The nightingales the nightingales | C |
- | |
O cold white moonlight of the north | L |
Refresh these pulses quench this hell | M |
O coverture of death drawn forth | L |
Across this garden chamber well | M |
But what have nightingales to do | N |
In gloomy England called the free | O |
Yes free to die in when we two | N |
Are sundered singing still to me | O |
And still they sing the nightingales | C |
- | |
I think I hear him how he cried | P |
'My own soul's life' between their notes | C |
Each man has but one soul supplied | P |
And that's immortal Though his throat's | C |
On fire with passion now to her | Q |
He can't say what to me he said | R |
And yet he moves her they aver | Q |
The nightingales sing through my head | R |
The nightingales the nightingales | C |
- | |
He says to her what moves her most | S |
He would not name his soul within | T |
Her hearing rather pays her cost | U |
With praises to her lips and chin | T |
Man has but one soul 'tis ordained | V |
And each soul but one love I add | W |
Yet souls are damned and love's profaned | W |
These nightingales will sing me mad | W |
The nightingales the nightingales | C |
- | |
I marvel how the birds can sing | X |
There's little difference in their view | N |
Betwixt our Tuscan trees that spring | X |
As vital flames into the blue | N |
And dull round blots of foliage meant | W |
Like saturated sponges here | Y |
To suck the fogs up As content | W |
Is he too in this land 'tis clear | Z |
And still they sing the nightingales | C |
- | |
My native Florence dear forgone | A2 |
I see across the Alpine ridge | B2 |
How the last feast day of Saint John | A2 |
Shot rockets from Carraia bridge | B2 |
The luminous city tall with fire | Q |
Trod deep down in that river of ours | C |
While many a boat with lamp and choir | Q |
Skimmed birdlike over glittering towers | C |
I will not hear these nightingales | C |
- | |
I seem to float we seem to float | W |
Down Arno's stream in festive guise | C |
A boat strikes flame into our boat | W |
And up that lady seems to rise | C |
As then she rose The shock had flashed | W |
A vision on us What a head | W |
What leaping eyeballs beauty dashed | W |
To splendour by a sudden dread | W |
And still they sing the nightingales | C |
- | |
Too bold to sin too weak to die | W |
Such women are so As for me | O |
I would we had drowned there he and I | W |
That moment loving perfectly | O |
He had not caught her with her loosed | W |
Gold ringlets rarer in the south | C2 |
Nor heard the 'Grazie tanto' bruised | W |
To sweetness by her English mouth | C2 |
And still they sing the nightingales | C |
- | |
She had not reached him at my heart | W |
With her fine tongue as snakes indeed | W |
Kill flies nor had I for my part | W |
Yearned after in my desperate need | W |
And followed him as he did her | Q |
To coasts left bitter by the tide | W |
Whose very nightingales elsewhere | D2 |
Delighting torture and deride | W |
For still they sing the nightingales | C |
- | |
A worthless woman mere cold clay | E2 |
As all false things are but so fair | D2 |
She takes the breath of men away | E2 |
Who gaze upon her unaware | D2 |
I would not play her larcenous tricks | C |
To have her looks She lied and stole | F2 |
And spat into my love's pure pyx | C |
The rank saliva of her soul | F2 |
And still they sing the nightingales | C |
- | |
I would not for her white and pink | G2 |
Though such he likes her grace of limb | H2 |
Though such he has praised nor yet I think | G2 |
For life itself though spent with him | H2 |
Commit such sacrilege affront | W |
God's nature which is love intrude | W |
'Twixt two affianced souls and hunt | W |
Like spiders in the altar's wood | W |
I cannot bear these nightingales | C |
- | |
If she chose sin some gentler guise | C |
She might have sinned in so it seems | C |
She might have pricked out both my eyes | C |
And I still seen him in my dreams | C |
Or drugged me in my soup or wine | I2 |
Nor left me angry afterward | W |
To die here with his hand in mine | I2 |
His breath upon me were not hard | W |
Our Lady hush these nightingales | C |
- | |
But set a springe for him 'mio ben' | I2 |
My only good my first last love | I |
Though Christ knows well what sin is when | I2 |
He sees some things done they must move | J2 |
Himself to wonder Let her pass | C |
I think of her by night and day | E2 |
Must I too join her out alas | C |
With Giulio in each word I say | E2 |
And evermore the nightingales | E2 |
- | |
Giulio my Giulio sing they so | E2 |
And you be silent Do I speak | K2 |
And you not hear An arm you throw | E2 |
Round some one and I feel so weak | K2 |
Oh owl like birds They sing for spite | W |
They sing for hate they sing for doom | L2 |
They'll sing through death who sing through night | W |
They'll sing and stun me in the tomb | L2 |
The nightingales the nightingales | E2 |
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
(1)
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