Sestina Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEF FAE D CF ABE ECBFA DEACFB BDF CAECAI wandered o'er the vast green plains of youth | A |
And searched for Pleasure On a distant height | B |
Fame's silhouette stood sharp against the skies | C |
Beyond vast crowds that thronged a broad highway | D |
I caught the glimmer of a golden goal | E |
While from a blooming bower smiled siren Love | F |
- | |
Straight gazing in her eyes I laughed at Love | F |
With all the haughty insolence of youth | A |
As past her bower I strode to seek my goal | E |
'Now will I climb to glory's dizzy height ' | - |
I said ' for there above the common way | D |
Doth pleasure dwell companioned by the skies ' | - |
- | |
But when I reached that summit near the skies | C |
So far from man I seemed so far from Love | F |
'Not here ' I cried 'doth Pleasure find her way ' | - |
Seen from the distant borderland of youth | A |
Fame smiles upon us from her sun kissed height | B |
But frowns in shadows when we reach the goal | E |
- | |
Then were mine eyes fixed on that glittering goal | E |
Dear to all sense sunk souls beneath the skies | C |
Gold tempts the artist from the lofty height | B |
Gold lures the maiden from the arms of Love | F |
Gold buys the fresh ingenuous heart of youth | A |
'And gold ' I said 'will show me Pleasure's way ' | - |
- | |
But ah the soil and discord of that way | D |
Where savage hordes rushed headlong to the goal | E |
Dead to the best impulses of their youth | A |
Blind to the azure beauty of the skies | C |
Dulled to the voice of conscience and of love | F |
They wandered far from Truth's eternal height | B |
- | |
Then Truth spoke to me from that noble height | B |
Saying 'Thou didst pass Pleasure on the way | D |
She with the yearning eyes so full of Love | F |
Whom thou disdained to seek for glory's goal ' | - |
Two blending paths beneath God's arching skies | C |
Lead straight to Pleasure Ah blind heart of youth | A |
Not up fame's height not toward the base god's goal | E |
Doth Pleasure make her way but 'neath calm skies | C |
Where Duty walks with Love in endless youth | A |
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
(1)
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