Childe Harold's Pilgrimage: A Romaunt. Canto Iii. Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCBCDCACAA AEFEGFHFHH AIJIJJKJLL AMNMNNONOO APAPAAQAQQ AARARRSPSS ATUTUUTUTT ATVTVVWVWW LTXTMMYMYY LTTTTTTTTT LZTZTTA2TA2A2 LTTTTTTTTT LLB2LB2B2C2B2C2C2 ALTLTTD2TD2D2 ANE2NB2B2TB2TT AXB2MB2B2F2B2F2F2 ATPTPPLPLL ALG2LG2G2MG2MM LTLTLLLLLL LDI | A |
Is thy face like thy mother's my fair child | B |
Ada sole daughter of my house and heart | C |
When last I saw thy young blue eyes they smiled | B |
And then we parted not as now we part | C |
But with a hope | D |
Awaking with a start | C |
The waters heave around me and on high | A |
The winds lift up their voices I depart | C |
Whither I know not but the hour's gone by | A |
When Albion's lessening shores could grieve or glad mine eye | A |
- | |
II | A |
Once more upon the waters yet once more | E |
And the waves bound beneath me as a steed | F |
That knows his rider Welcome to their roar | E |
Swift be their guidance wheresoe'er it lead | G |
Though the strain'd mast should quiver as a reed | F |
And the rent canvas fluttering strew the gale | H |
Still must I on for I am as a weed | F |
Flung from the rock on Ocean's foam to sail | H |
Where'er the surge may sweep or tempest's breath prevail | H |
- | |
III | A |
In my youth's summer I did sing of One | I |
The wandering outlaw of his own dark mind | J |
Again I seize the theme then but begun | I |
And bear it with me as the rushing wind | J |
Bears the cloud onwards in that Tale I find | J |
The furrows of long thought and dried up tears | K |
Which ebbing leave a sterile track behind | J |
O'er which all heavily the journeying years | L |
Plod the last sands of life where not a flower appears | L |
- | |
IV | A |
Since my young days of passion joy or pain | M |
Perchance my heart and harp have lost a string | N |
And both may jar it may be that in vain | M |
I would essay as I have sung to sing | N |
Yet though a dreary strain to this I cling | N |
So that it wean me from the weary dream | O |
Of selfish grief or gladness so it fling | N |
Forgetfulness around me it shall seem | O |
To me though to none else a not ungrateful theme | O |
- | |
V | A |
He who grown aged in this world of woe | P |
In deeds not years piercing the depths of life | A |
So that no wonder waits him nor below | P |
Can love or sorrow fame ambition strife | A |
Cut to his heart again with the keen knife | A |
Of silent sharp endurance he can tell | Q |
Why thought seeks refuge in lone caves yet rife | A |
With airy images and shapes which dwell | Q |
Still unimpair'd though old in the soul's haunted cell | Q |
- | |
VI | A |
'Tis to create and in creating life | A |
A being more intense that we endow | R |
With form our fancy gaining as we give | A |
The life we image even as I do now | R |
What am I Nothing but not so art thou | R |
Soul of my thought with whom I traverse earth | S |
Invisible but gazing as I grow | P |
Mix'd with thy spirit blended with thy birth | S |
And feeling still with thee in my crush'd feeling's dearth | S |
- | |
VII | A |
Yet must I think less wildly I have thought | T |
Too long and darkly till my brain became | U |
In its own eddy boiling and o'erwrought | T |
A whirling gulf of phantasy and flame | U |
And thus untaught in youth my heart to tame | U |
My springs of life were poison'd 'Tis too late | T |
Yet am I chang'd though still enough the same | U |
In strength to bear what time can not abate | T |
And feed on bitter fruits without accusing Fate | T |
- | |
VIII | A |
Something too much of this but now 'tis past | T |
And the spell closes with its silent seal | V |
Long absent HAROLD re appears at last | T |
He of the breast which fain no more would feel | V |
Wrung with the wounds which kill not but ne'er heal | V |
Yet Time who changes all had altered him | W |
In sould and aspect as in age years steal | V |
Fire from the mind as vigour from the limb | W |
And life's enchanted cup but sparkles near the brim | W |
- | |
IX | L |
His had been quaff'd too quickly and he found | T |
The dregs were wormwood but he fill'd again | X |
And from a purer fount on holier ground | T |
And deem'd its spring perpetual but in vain | M |
Still round him clung invisibly a chain | M |
Which gall'd for ever fettering though unseen | Y |
And heavy though it clank'd not worn with pain | M |
Which pined although it spoke not and grew keen | Y |
Entering with every step he took through many a scene | Y |
- | |
X | L |
Secure in guarded coldness he had mix'd | T |
Again in fancied safety with his kind | T |
And deem'd his spirit now so firmly fix'd | T |
And sheath'd with an invulnerable mind | T |
That if no joy no sorrow lurk'd behind | T |
And he as one might midst the many stand | T |
Unheeded searching through the crowd to find | T |
Fit speculation such as in strange land | T |
He found in wonder works of God and Nature's hand | T |
- | |
XI | L |
But who can view the ripened rose nor seek | Z |
To wear it who can curiously behold | T |
The smoothness and the sheen of beauty's cheek | Z |
Nor feel the heart can never all grow old | T |
Who can contemplate Fame through clouds unfold | T |
The star which rises o'er her steep nor climb | A2 |
Harold once more within the vortex roll'd | T |
On with the giddy circle chasing Time | A2 |
Yet with a nobler aim than in his youth's fond prime | A2 |
- | |
XII | L |
But soon he knew himself the most unfit | T |
Of men to herd with man with whom he held | T |
Little in common untaught to submit | T |
His thoughts to others though his soul was quell'd | T |
In youth by his own thoughts still uncompell'd | T |
He would not yield dominion of his mind | T |
To spirits against whom his own rebell'd | T |
Proud though in desolation which could find | T |
A life within itself to breathe without mankind | T |
- | |
XIII | L |
Where rose the mountains there to him were friends | L |
Where roll'd the ocean theron was his home | B2 |
Where a blue sky and glowing clime extends | L |
He had the passion and the power to roam | B2 |
The desert forest cavern breaker's foam | B2 |
Were unto him companionship they spake | C2 |
A mutual language clearer than the tome | B2 |
Of his land's tongue which he would oft forsake | C2 |
For Nature's pages glass'd by sunbeams on the lake | C2 |
- | |
XIV | A |
Like the Chaldean he could watch the stars | L |
Till he had peopled them with beings bright | T |
As their own beams and earth and earth born jars | L |
And human frailties were forgotten quite | T |
Could he have kept his spirit to that flight | T |
He had been happy but this clay will sink | D2 |
Its spark immortal envying it the light | T |
To which it mounts as if to break the link | D2 |
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brink | D2 |
- | |
XV | A |
But in Man's dwellings he became a thing | N |
Restless and worn and stern and wearisome | E2 |
Droop'd as a wild born falcon with clipt wing | N |
To whom the boundless air alone were home | B2 |
Then came his fit again which to o'ercome | B2 |
As eagerly the barr'd up bird will beat | T |
His breast and beak against his wiry dome | B2 |
Till the blood tinge his plumage so the heat | T |
Of his impeded soul would through his bosom eat | T |
- | |
XVI | A |
Self exiled Harold wanders forth again | X |
With nought of hope left but with less of gloom | B2 |
The very knowledge that he lived in vain | M |
That all was over on this side the tomb | B2 |
Had made Despair a smilingness assume | B2 |
Which though 'twer wild as on the plundered wreck | F2 |
When mariners would madly meet their doom | B2 |
With draughts intemperate on the sinking deck | F2 |
Did yet inspire a cheer which he forbore to check | F2 |
- | |
XVII | A |
Stop for thy tread is on an Empire's dust | T |
An earthquake's spoil is sepulchred below | P |
Is the spot mark'd with no colossal bust | T |
Nor column trophied for triumphal show | P |
None but the moral's truth tells simpler so | P |
As the ground was before thus let it be | L |
How that red rain hath made the harvest grow | P |
And is this all the world has gained by thee | L |
Thou first and last of fields king making Victory | L |
- | |
XVIII | A |
And Harold stands upon this place of skulls | L |
The grave of France the deadly Waterloo | G2 |
How in an hour the power which gave annuls | L |
Its gifts transferring fame as fleeting too | G2 |
In 'pride of place' here last the eagle flew | G2 |
Then tore with bloody talon the rent plain | M |
Pierced by the shaft of banded nations through | G2 |
Ambition's life and labours all were vain | M |
He wears the shattered links of the world's broken chain | M |
- | |
XIX | L |
Fit retribution Gaul may champ the bit | T |
And foam in fetters but is Earth more free | L |
Did nations combat to make One submit | T |
Or league to teach all kings true sovereignty | L |
What shall reviving Thraldom again be | L |
The patched up idol of enlightened days | L |
Shall we who struck the Lion down shall we | L |
Pay the Wolf homage proffering lowly gaze | L |
And servile knees to thrones No prove before ye praise | L |
- | |
XX | L |
If not o'er one fallen desp | D |
George Gordon Byron
(1)
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