Hero And Leander. The Sixth Sestiad Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCCBADEFFGGHHIIJKLL MMNNOOKKPPQQGGLKBABR RSSTTUVKKWWXXLLKKBBK JKKLLLLKKWWLLLLLLLLL LYZA2A2LLB2B2LLC2D2L LLLLLE2E2E2F2G2WWLLH 2H2I2I2J2J2LLLLKKK2K 2WJLLL2L2M2M2KWLLKKL LN2N2AHKKLLO2O2WWLLP 2Q2R2R2LLS2S2LLLLT2T 2LLKKU2V2LLT2T2LLLNo longer could the Day nor Destinies | A |
Delay the Night who now did frowning rise | B |
Into her throne and at her humorous breasts | C |
Visions and Dreams lay sucking all men's rests | C |
Fell like the mists of death upon their eyes | B |
Day's too long darts so kill'd their faculties | A |
The Winds yet like the flowers to cease began | D |
For bright Leucote Venus' whitest swan | E |
That held sweet Hero dear spread her fair wings | F |
Like to a field of snow and message brings | F |
From Venus to the Fates t'entreat them lay | G |
Their charge upon the Winds their rage to stay | G |
That the stern battle of the seas might cease | H |
And guard Leander to his love in peace | H |
The Fates consent ay me dissembling Fates | I |
They showed their favours to conceal their hates | I |
And draw Leander on lest seas too high | J |
Should stay his too obsequious destiny | K |
Who like a fleering slavish parasite | L |
In warping profit or a traitorous sleight | L |
Hoops round his rotten body with devotes | M |
And pricks his descant face full of false notes | M |
Praising with open throat and oaths as foul | N |
As his false heart the beauty of an owl | N |
Kissing his skipping hand with charmed skips | O |
That cannot leave but leaps upon his lips | O |
Like a cock sparrow or a shameless quean | K |
Sharp at a red lipp'd youth and naught doth mean | K |
Of all his antic shows but doth repair | P |
More tender fawns and takes a scatter'd hair | P |
From his tame subject's shoulder whips and calls | Q |
For everything he lacks creeps 'gainst the walls | Q |
With backward humbless to give needless way | G |
Thus his false fate did with Leander play | G |
First to black Eurus flies the white Leucote | L |
Born 'mongst the negroes in the Levant sea | K |
On whose curl'd heads the glowing sun doth rise | B |
And shows the sovereign will of Destinies | A |
To have him cease his blasts and down he lies | B |
Next to the fenny Notus course she holds | R |
And found him leaning with his arms in folds | R |
Upon a rock his white hair full of showers | S |
And him she chargeth by the fatal powers | S |
To hold in his wet cheeks his cloudy voice | T |
To Zephyr then that doth in flowers rejoice | T |
To snake foot Boreas next she did remove | U |
And found him tossing of his ravished love | V |
To heat his frosty bosom hid in snow | K |
Who with Leucote's sight did cease to blow | K |
Thus all were still to Hero's heart's desire | W |
Who with all speed did consecrate a fire | W |
Of flaming gums and comfortable spice | X |
To light her torch which in such curious price | X |
She held being object to Leander's sight | L |
That naught but fires perfumed must give it light | L |
She loved it so she griev'd to see it burn | K |
Since it would waste and soon to ashes turn | K |
Yet if it burned not 'twere not worth her eyes | B |
What made it nothing gave it all the prize | B |
Sweet torch true glass of our society | K |
What man does good but he consumes thereby | J |
But thou wert loved for good held high given show | K |
Poor virtue loathed for good obscured held low | K |
Do good be pined be deedless good disgraced | L |
Unless we feed on men we let them fast | L |
Yet Hero with these thoughts her torch did spend | L |
When bees make wax Nature doth not intend | L |
It should be made a torch but we that know | K |
The proper virtue of it make it so | K |
And when 'tis made we light it nor did Nature | W |
Propose one life to maids but each such creature | W |
Makes by her soul the best of her free state | L |
Which without love is rude disconsolate | L |
And wants love's fire to make it mild and bright | L |
Till when maids are but torches wanting light | L |
Thus 'gainst our grief not cause of grief we fight | L |
The right of naught is glean'd but the delight | L |
Up went she but to tell how she descended | L |
Would God she were dead or my verse ended | L |
She was the rule of wishes sum and end | L |
For all the parts that did on love depend | L |
Yet cast the torch his brightness further forth | Y |
But what shines nearest best holds truest worth | Z |
Leander did not through such tempests swim | A2 |
To kiss the torch although it lighted him | A2 |
But all his powers in her desires awaked | L |
Her love and virtues clothed him richly naked | L |
Men kiss but fire that only shows pursue | B2 |
Her torch and Hero figure show and virtue | B2 |
Now at opposed Abydos naught was heard | L |
But bleating flocks and many a bellowing herd | L |
Slain for the nuptials cracks of falling woods | C2 |
Blows of broad axes pourings out of floods | D2 |
The guilty Hellespont was mix'd and stained | L |
With bloody torrents that the shambles rained | L |
Not arguments of feast but shows that bled | L |
Foretelling that red night that followed | L |
More blood was spilt more honours were addrest | L |
Than could have graced any happy feast | L |
Rich banquets triumphs every pomp employs | E2 |
His sumptuous hand no miser's nuptial joys | E2 |
Air felt continual thunder with the noise | E2 |
Made in the general marriage violence | F2 |
And no man knew the cause of this expense | G2 |
But the two hapless lords Leander's sire | W |
And poor Leander poorest where the fire | W |
Of credulous love made him most rich surmis'd | L |
As short was he of that himself he prized | L |
As is an empty gallant full of form | H2 |
That thinks each look an act each drop a storm | H2 |
That falls from his brave breathings most brought up | I2 |
In our metropolis and hath his cup | I2 |
Brought after him to feasts and much palm bears | J2 |
For his rare judgment in th' attire he wears | J2 |
Hath seen the hot Low Countries not their heat | L |
Observes their rampires and their buildings yet | L |
And for your sweet discourse with mouths is heard | L |
Giving instructions with his very beard | L |
Hath gone with an ambassador and been | K |
A great man's mate in travelling even to Rhene | K |
And then puts all his worth in such a face | K2 |
As he saw brave men make and strives for grace | K2 |
To get his news forth as when you descry | W |
A ship with all her sail contends to fly | J |
Out of the narrow Thames with winds unapt | L |
Now crosseth here then there then this way rapt | L |
And then hath one point reach'd then alters all | L2 |
And to another crooked reach doth fall | L2 |
Of half a bird bolt's shoot keeping more coil | M2 |
Than if she danc'd upon the ocean's toil | M2 |
So serious is his trifling company | K |
In all his swelling ship of vacantry | W |
And so short of himself in his high thought | L |
Was our Leander in his fortunes brought | L |
And in his fort of love that he thought won | K |
But otherwise he scorns comparison | K |
O sweet Leander thy large worth I hide | L |
In a short grave ill favour'd storms must chide | L |
Thy sacred favour I in floods of ink | N2 |
Must drown thy graces which white papers drink | N2 |
Even as thy beauties did the foul black seas | A |
I must describe the hell of thy decease | H |
That heaven did merit yet I needs must see | K |
Our painted fools and cockhorse peasantry | K |
Still still usurp with long lives loves and lust | L |
The seats of Virtue cutting short as dust | L |
Her dear bought issue ill to worse converts | O2 |
And tramples in the blood of all deserts | O2 |
Night close and silent now goes fast before | W |
The captains and the soldiers to the shore | W |
On whom attended the appointed fleet | L |
At Sestos' bay that should Leander meet | L |
Who feigned he in another ship would pass | P2 |
Which must not be for no one mean there was | Q2 |
To get his love home but the course he took | R2 |
Forth did his beauty for his beauty look | R2 |
And saw her through her torch as you behold | L |
Sometimes within the sun a face of gold | L |
Formed in strong thoughts by that tradition's force | S2 |
That says a god sits there and guides his course | S2 |
His sister was with him to whom he show'd | L |
His guide by sea and said 'Oft have you view'd | L |
In one heaven many stars but never yet | L |
In one star many heavens till now were met | L |
See lovely sister see now Hero shines | T2 |
No heaven but her appears each star repines | T2 |
And all are clad in clouds as if they mourned | L |
To be by influence of earth out burned | L |
Yet doth she shine and teacheth Virtue's train | K |
Still to be constant in hell's blackest reign | K |
Though even the gods themselves do so entreat them | U2 |
As they did hate and earth as she would eat them ' | V2 |
Off went his silken robe and in he leapt | L |
Whom the kind waves so licorously cleapt | L |
Thickening for haste one in another so | T2 |
To kiss his skin that he might almost go | T2 |
To Hero's tower had that kind minute lasted | L |
But now the cruel Fates with Ate hasted | L |
To all the winds and made | L |
George Chapman
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