Lepanto Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBCCDDEEFFAA GGHHIIJJKLMM NNOODPQQD KLRRRRSSATTS AADDUUVVVVVVAAAAVVW KLPQQQ XXVVAAYYZZDDCCPQQC A2A2AAAAQQB2B2VVPPQV C2C2QQDDD2D2E2E2E2E2 IIAAF2F2AAG2G2E2E2E2 E2AQQE2 H2H2AAVVWhite founts falling in the courts of the sun | A |
And the Soldan of Byzantium is smiling as they run | A |
There is laughter like the fountains in that face of all men feared | B |
It stirs the forest darkness the darkness of his beard | B |
It curls the blood red crescent the crescent of his lips | C |
For the inmost sea of all the earth is shaken with his ships | C |
They have dared the white republics up the capes of Italy | D |
They have dashed the Adriatic round the Lion of the Sea | D |
And the Pope has cast his arms abroad for agony and loss | E |
And called the kings of Christendom for swords about the Cross | E |
The cold queen of England is looking in the glass | F |
The shadow of the Valois is yawning at the Mass | F |
From evening isles fantastical rings faint the Spanish gun | A |
And the Lord upon the Golden Horn is laughing in the sun | A |
- | |
Dim drums throbbing in the hills half heard | G |
Where only on a nameless throne a crownless prince has stirred | G |
Where risen from a doubtful seat and half attainted stall | H |
The last knight of Europe takes weapons from the wall | H |
The last and lingering troubadour to whom the bird has sung | I |
That once went singing southward when all the world was young | I |
In that enormous silence tiny and unafraid | J |
Comes up along the winding road the noise of the Crusade | J |
Strong gongs groaning as the guns boom far | K |
Don John of Austria is going to the war | L |
Stiff flags straining in the night blasts cold | M |
In the gloom black purple in the glint old gold | M |
- | |
Torchlight crimson on the copper kettle drums | N |
Then the tuckets then the trumpets then the cannon and he comes | N |
Don John laughing in the brave beard curled | O |
Spurning of his stirrups like the throne of all the world | O |
Holding his head up for a flag of all the free | D |
Love light of Spain hurrah | P |
Death light of Africa | Q |
Don John of Austria | Q |
Is riding to the sea | D |
- | |
Mahound is in his paradise above the evening star | K |
Don John of Austria is going to the war | L |
He moves a mighty turban on the timeless houri's knees | R |
His turban that is woven of the sunset and the seas | R |
He shakes the peacock gardens as he rises from his ease | R |
And he strides among the tree tops and is taller than the trees | R |
And his voice through all the garden is a thunder sent to bring | S |
Black Azrael and Ariel and Ammon on the wing | S |
Giants and the Genii | A |
Multiple of wing and eye | T |
Whose strong obedience broke the sky | T |
When Solomon was king | S |
- | |
They rush in red and purple from the red clouds of the morn | A |
From temples where the yellow gods shut up their eyes in scorn | A |
They rise in green robes roaring from the green hells of the sea | D |
Where fallen skies and evil hues and eyeless creatures be | D |
On them the sea valves cluster and the grey sea forests curl | U |
Splashed with a splendid sickness the sickness of the pearl | U |
They swell in sapphire smoke out of the blue cracks of the ground | V |
They gather and they wonder and give worship to Mahound | V |
And he saith 'Break up the mountains where the hermit folk can hide | V |
And sift the red and silver sands lest bone of saint abide | V |
And chase the Giaours flying night and day not giving rest | V |
For that which was our trouble comes again out of the west | V |
We have set the seal of Solomon on all things under sun | A |
Of knowledge and of sorrow and endurance of things done | A |
But noise is in the mountains in the mountains and I know | A |
The voice that shook our palaces four hundred years ago | A |
It is he that saith not 'Kismet' it is he that knows not Fate | V |
It is Richard it is Raymond it is Godfrey at the gate | V |
It is he whose loss is laughter when he counts the wager worth | W |
Put down your feet upon him that our peace be on the earth ' | - |
For he heard drums groaning and he heard guns jar | K |
Don John of Austria is going to the war | L |
Sudden and still hurrah | P |
Bolt from Iberia | Q |
Don John of Austria | Q |
Is gone by Alcalar | Q |
- | |
St Michael's on his mountain in the sea roads of the north | X |
Don John of Austria is girt and going forth | X |
Where the grey seas glitter and the sharp tides shift | V |
And the sea folk labour and the red sails lift | V |
He shakes his lance of iron and he claps his wings of stone | A |
The noise is gone through Normandy the noise is gone alone | A |
The North is full of tangled things and texts and aching eyes | Y |
And dead is all the innocence of anger and surprise | Y |
And Christian killeth Christian in a narrow dusty room | Z |
And Christian dreadeth Christ that hath a newer face of doom | Z |
And Christian hateth Mary that God kissed in Galilee | D |
But Don John of Austria is riding to the sea | D |
Don John calling through the blast and the eclipse | C |
Crying with the trumpet with the trumpet of his lips | C |
Trumpet that sayeth ha | P |
Domino gloria | Q |
Don John of Austria | Q |
Is shouting to the ships | C |
- | |
King Philip's in his closet with the Fleece about his neck | A2 |
Don Juan of Austria is armed upon the deck | A2 |
The walls are hung with velvet that is black and soft as sin | A |
And little dwarfs creep out of it and little dwarfs creep in | A |
He holds a crystal phial that has colours like the moon | A |
He touches and it tingles and he trembles very soon | A |
And his face is as a fungus of a leprous white and grey | Q |
Like plants in the high houses that are shuttered from the day | Q |
And death is in the phial and the end of noble work | B2 |
But Don John of Austria has fired upon the Turk | B2 |
Don John's hunting and his hounds have bayed | V |
Booms away past Italy the rumour of his raid | V |
Gun upon gun ha ha | P |
Gun upon gun hurrah | P |
Don John of Austria | Q |
Has loosed the cannonade | V |
- | |
The Pope was in his chapel before day or battle broke | C2 |
Don John of Austria is hidden in the smoke | C2 |
The hidden room in man's house where God sits all the year | Q |
The secret window whence the world looks small and very dear | Q |
He sees as in a mirror on the monstrous twilight sea | D |
The crescent of his cruel ships whose name is mystery | D |
They fling great shadows foe wards making Cross and Castle dark | D2 |
They veil the plum egrave d lions on the galley's of St Mark | D2 |
And above the ships are palaces of brown black bearded chiefs | E2 |
And below the ships are prisons where with multitudinous griefs | E2 |
Christian captives sick and sunless all a labouring race repines | E2 |
Like a race in sunken cities like a nation in the mines | E2 |
They are lost like slaves that swat and in the skies of morning hung | I |
The stair ways of the tallest gods when tyranny was young | I |
They are countless voiceless hopeless as those fallen or fleeing on | A |
Before the high Kings' horses in the granite of Babylon | A |
And many a one grows witless in his quiet room in hell | F2 |
Where a yellow face looks inward through the lattice of his cell | F2 |
And he finds his God forgotten and he seeks no more a sign | A |
But Don John of Austria has burst the battle line | A |
Don John pounding from the slaughter painted poop | G2 |
Purpling all the ocean like a bloody pirate's sloop | G2 |
Scarlet running over on the silvers and the golds | E2 |
Breaking of the hatches up and bursting of the holds | E2 |
Thronging of the thousands up that labour under sea | E2 |
White for bliss and blind for sun and stunned for liberty | E2 |
Vivat Hispania | A |
Domino Gloria | Q |
Don John of Austria | Q |
Has set his people free | E2 |
- | |
Cervantes on his galley sets the sword back in the sheath | H2 |
Don John of Austria rides homeward with a wreath | H2 |
And he sees across a weary land a straggling road in Spain | A |
Upon which a lean and foolish knight forever rides in vain | A |
And he smiles but not as Sultans smile and settles back the blade | V |
But Don John of Austria rides home from the Crusade | V |
G. K. Chesterton
(3)
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