A Waif Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABABCCDAEFA EGEGHIIHEJKL MNODPFQRRPQ| My soul is like a poor caged bird to night | A |
| Beating its wings against the prison bars | B |
| Longing to reach the outer world of light | A |
| And all untrammelled soar among the stars | B |
| Wild mighty thoughts struggle within my soul | C |
| For utterance Great waves of passion roll | C |
| Through all my being As the lightnings play | D |
| Through thunder clouds so beams of blinding light | A |
| Flash for a moment on my darkened brain | E |
| Quick sudden glaring beams that fade wawy | F |
| And leave me in a darker deeper night | A |
| - | |
| Oh poet sould that struggle all in vain | E |
| To live in peace and harmony with earth | G |
| It cannot be They must endure the pain | E |
| Of conscience and unacknoeledged worth | G |
| Moving and dwelling with the common herd | H |
| Whose highest thought has never strayed as far | I |
| Or never strayed beyond the horizon's bar | I |
| Whose narrow hearts and souls are never stirred | H |
| With keenest pleasures or with sharpest pain | E |
| Who rise and eat and sleep and rise again | J |
| Nor question why or wherefore Men whose minds | K |
| Are never shaken by wild passion winds | L |
| - | |
| Women whose broadest deepeat realm of thought | M |
| The bridal veil will cover | N |
| Who see not | O |
| God's mighty work lying undone to day | D |
| Work that a woman's hands can do as well | P |
| Oh soul of mine better to live alway | F |
| In this tumultuous inward pain and strife | Q |
| Doing the work that in thy reach doth fall | R |
| Weeping because thou canst not do it all | R |
| Oh better my soul in this unrest to dwell | P |
| Than grovel as they grovel on through life | Q |
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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