The Prisoner. A Fragment Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABCDDEE FFG HHII JJK LIMM NNOO PPQ IIOO RST URVV WWOO XXYY OOZA2 B2C2D2 B2B2E2E2 T F2| In the dungeon crypts idly did I stray | A |
| Reckless of the lives wasting there away | A |
| 'Draw the ponderous bars open Warder stern ' | B |
| He dare not say me nay the hinges harshly turn | C |
| 'Our guests are darkly lodged ' I whispered gazing through | D |
| The vault whose grated eye showed heaven more grey than blue | D |
| This was when glad spring laughed in awaking pride | E |
| 'Aye darkly lodged enough ' returned my sullen guide | E |
| - | |
| Then God forgive my youth forgive my careless tongue | F |
| I scoffed as the chill chains on the damp flagstones rung | F |
| 'Confined in triple walls art thou so much to fear | G |
| That we must bind thee down and clench thy fetters here ' | - |
| - | |
| The captive raised her face it was as soft and mild | H |
| As sculptured marble saint or slumbering unweaned child | H |
| It was so soft and mild it was so sweet and fair | I |
| Pain could not trace a line nor grief a shadow there | I |
| - | |
| The captive raised her hand and pressed it to her brow | J |
| 'I have been struck ' she said 'and I am suffering now | J |
| Yet these are little worth your bolts and irons strong | K |
| And were they forged in steel they could not hold me long ' | - |
| - | |
| Hoarse laughed the jailor grim 'Shall I be won to hear | L |
| Dost think fond dreaming wretch that I shall grant thy prayer | I |
| Or better still wilt melt my master's heart with groans | M |
| Ah sooner might the sun thaw down these granite stones | M |
| - | |
| 'My master's voice is low his aspect bland and kind | N |
| But hard as hardest flint the soul that lurks behind | N |
| And I am rough and rude yet not more rough to see | O |
| Than is the hidden ghost which has its home in me | O |
| - | |
| About her lips there played a smile of almost scorn | P |
| 'My friend ' she gently said 'you have not heard me mourn | P |
| When you my parents' lives my lost life can restore | Q |
| Then may I weep and sue but never Friend before ' | - |
| - | |
| 'Yet tell them Julian all I am not doomed to wear | I |
| Year after year in gloom and desolate despair | I |
| A messenger of Hope comes every night to me | O |
| And offers for short life eternal liberty | O |
| - | |
| He comes with western winds with evening's wandering airs | R |
| With that clear dusk of heaven that brings the thickest stars | S |
| Winds take a pensive tone and stars a tender fire And visions rise and change which kill me with desire | T |
| - | |
| 'Desire for nothing known in my maturer years | U |
| When joy grew mad with awe at counting future tears | R |
| When if my spirit's sky was full of flashes warm | V |
| I knew not whence they came from sun or thunderstorm | V |
| - | |
| 'But first a hush of peace a soundless calm descends | W |
| The struggle of distress and fierce impatience ends | W |
| Mute music soothes my breast unuttered harmony | O |
| That I could never dream till earth was lost to me | O |
| - | |
| 'Then dawns the Invisible the Unseen its truth reveals | X |
| My outward sense is gone my inward essence feels | X |
| Its wings are almost free its home its harbour found | Y |
| Measuring the gulf it stoops and dares the final bound | Y |
| - | |
| 'Oh dreadful is the check intense the agony | O |
| When the ear begins to hear and the eye begins to see | O |
| When the pulse begins to throb the brain to think again | Z |
| The soul to feel the flesh and the flesh to feel the chain | A2 |
| - | |
| 'Yet I would lose no sting would wish no torture less go | B2 |
| The more that anguish racks the earlier it will bless | C2 |
| And robed in fires of Hell or bright with heavenly shine | D2 |
| If it but herald Death the vision is divine ' | - |
| - | |
| She ceased to speak and we unanswering turned to go | B2 |
| We had no further power to work the captive woe | B2 |
| Her cheek he gleaming eye declared that man had given | E2 |
| A sentence unapproved and overruled by Heaven | E2 |
| - | |
| - | |
| October | T |
| - | |
| This poem is part of a larger Gondal poem which Emily revised for publication in She cut lines and She added the concluding stanza which starts with 'She ceased to speak ' The original title of the poem is 'Julian M and A G Rochelle ' the names of two lovers in the Gondal saga | F2 |
Emily Jane Bronta
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