Don Juan: Canto The Tenth Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABABACDD EFEFEFGG HIJIJIKE ILILILMM NONPNOEE QE EQEII RJRJRJEE HBHBJBSS GIGIGISS ETETETEE USUS SVV ESESESEE EK KEIEE WXWXWXBB SISISIYZ A2JA2J JB2B2 IA2IA2IC2C2 D2ED2EE2EA2 F2IF2IF2IG2 H2RH2RH2RSS BEBEBEII DI2DI2DJ2K2K2 G2EL2EE| When Newton saw an apple fall he found | A |
| In that slight startle from his contemplation | B |
| 'Tis said for I 'll not answer above ground | A |
| For any sage's creed or calculation | B |
| A mode of proving that the earth turn'd round | A |
| In a most natural whirl called 'gravitation ' | C |
| And this is the sole mortal who could grapple | D |
| Since Adam with a fall or with an apple | D |
| - | |
| Man fell with apples and with apples rose | E |
| If this be true for we must deem the mode | F |
| In which Sir Isaac Newton could disclose | E |
| Through the then unpaved stars the turnpike road | F |
| A thing to counterbalance human woes | E |
| For ever since immortal man hath glow'd | F |
| With all kinds of mechanics and full soon | G |
| Steam engines will conduct him to the moon | G |
| - | |
| And wherefore this exordium Why just now | H |
| In taking up this paltry sheet of paper | I |
| My bosom underwent a glorious glow | J |
| And my internal spirit cut a caper | I |
| And though so much inferior as I know | J |
| To those who by the dint of glass and vapour | I |
| Discover stars and sail in the wind's eye | K |
| I wish to do as much by poesy | E |
| - | |
| In the wind's eye I have sail'd and sail but for | I |
| The stars I own my telescope is dim | L |
| But at least I have shunn'd the common shore | I |
| And leaving land far out of sight would skim | L |
| The ocean of eternity the roar | I |
| Of breakers has not daunted my slight trim | L |
| But still sea worthy skiff and she may float | M |
| Where ships have founder'd as doth many a boat | M |
| - | |
| We left our hero Juan in the bloom | N |
| Of favouritism but not yet in the blush | O |
| And far be it from my Muses to presume | N |
| For I have more than one Muse at a push | P |
| To follow him beyond the drawing room | N |
| It is enough that Fortune found him flush | O |
| Of youth and vigour beauty and those things | E |
| Which for an instant clip enjoyment's wings | E |
| - | |
| But soon they grow again and leave their nest | Q |
| 'Oh ' saith the Psalmist 'that I had a dove's | E |
| Pinions to flee away and be at rest ' | - |
| And who that recollects young years and loves | E |
| Though hoary now and with a withering breast | Q |
| And palsied fancy which no longer roves | E |
| Beyond its dimm'd eye's sphere but would much rather | I |
| Sigh like his son than cough like his grandfather | I |
| - | |
| But sighs subside and tears even widows' shrink | R |
| Like Arno in the summer to a shallow | J |
| So narrow as to shame their wintry brink | R |
| Which threatens inundations deep and yellow | J |
| Such difference doth a few months make You 'd think | R |
| Grief a rich field which never would lie fallow | J |
| No more it doth its ploughs but change their boys | E |
| Who furrow some new soil to sow for joys | E |
| - | |
| But coughs will come when sighs depart and now | H |
| And then before sighs cease for oft the one | B |
| Will bring the other ere the lake like brow | H |
| Is ruffled by a wrinkle or the sun | B |
| Of life reach'd ten o'clock and while a glow | J |
| Hectic and brief as summer's day nigh done | B |
| O'erspreads the cheek which seems too pure for clay | S |
| Thousands blaze love hope die how happy they | S |
| - | |
| But Juan was not meant to die so soon | G |
| We left him in the focus of such glory | I |
| As may be won by favour of the moon | G |
| Or ladies' fancies rather transitory | I |
| Perhaps but who would scorn the month of June | G |
| Because December with his breath so hoary | I |
| Must come Much rather should he court the ray | S |
| To hoard up warmth against a wintry day | S |
| - | |
| Besides he had some qualities which fix | E |
| Middle aged ladies even more than young | T |
| The former know what's what while new fledged chicks | E |
| Know little more of love than what is sung | T |
| In rhymes or dreamt for fancy will play tricks | E |
| In visions of those skies from whence Love sprung | T |
| Some reckon women by their suns or years | E |
| I rather think the moon should date the dears | E |
| - | |
| And why because she's changeable and chaste | U |
| I know no other reason whatsoe'er | S |
| Suspicious people who find fault in haste | U |
| May choose to tax me with which is not fair | S |
| Nor flattering to 'their temper or their taste ' | - |
| As my friend Jeffrey writes with such an air | S |
| However I forgive him and I trust | V |
| He will forgive himself if not I must | V |
| - | |
| Old enemies who have become new friends | E |
| Should so continue 'tis a point of honour | S |
| And I know nothing which could make amends | E |
| For a return to hatred I would shun her | S |
| Like garlic howsoever she extends | E |
| Her hundred arms and legs and fain outrun her | S |
| Old flames new wives become our bitterest foes | E |
| Converted foes should scorn to join with those | E |
| - | |
| This were the worst desertion renegadoes | E |
| Even shuffling Southey that incarnate lie | K |
| Would scarcely join again the 'reformadoes ' | - |
| Whom he forsook to fill the laureate's sty | K |
| And honest men from Iceland to Barbadoes | E |
| Whether in Caledon or Italy | I |
| Should not veer round with every breath nor seize | E |
| To pain the moment when you cease to please | E |
| - | |
| The lawyer and the critic but behold | W |
| The baser sides of literature and life | X |
| And nought remains unseen but much untold | W |
| By those who scour those double vales of strife | X |
| While common men grow ignorantly old | W |
| The lawyer's brief is like the surgeon's knife | X |
| Dissecting the whole inside of a question | B |
| And with it all the process of digestion | B |
| - | |
| A legal broom's a moral chimney sweeper | S |
| And that's the reason he himself's so dirty | I |
| The endless soot bestows a tint far deeper | S |
| Than can be hid by altering his shirt he | I |
| Retains the sable stains of the dark creeper | S |
| At least some twenty nine do out of thirty | I |
| In all their habits not so you I own | Y |
| As Caesar wore his robe you wear your gown | Z |
| - | |
| And all our little feuds at least all mine | A2 |
| Dear Jefferson once my most redoubted foe | J |
| As far as rhyme and criticism combine | A2 |
| To make such puppets of us things below | J |
| Are over Here's a health to 'Auld Lang Syne ' | - |
| I do not know you and may never know | J |
| Your face but you have acted on the whole | B2 |
| Most nobly and I own it from my soul | B2 |
| - | |
| And when I use the phrase of 'Auld Lang Syne ' | - |
| 'Tis not address'd to you the more 's the pity | I |
| For me for I would rather take my wine | A2 |
| With you than aught save Scott in your proud city | I |
| But somehow it may seem a schoolboy's whine | A2 |
| And yet I seek not to be grand nor witty | I |
| But I am half a Scot by birth and bred | C2 |
| A whole one and my heart flies to my head | C2 |
| - | |
| As 'Auld Lang Syne' brings Scotland one and all | D2 |
| Scotch plaids Scotch snoods the blue hills and clear streams | E |
| The Dee the Don Balgounie's brig's black wall | D2 |
| All my boy feelings all my gentler dreams | E |
| Of what I then dreamt clothed in their own pall | E2 |
| Like Banquo's offspring floating past me seems | E |
| My childhood in this childishness of mine | A2 |
| I care not 'tis a glimpse of 'Auld Lang Syne ' | - |
| - | |
| And though as you remember in a fit | F2 |
| Of wrath and rhyme when juvenile and curly | I |
| I rail'd at Scots to show my wrath and wit | F2 |
| Which must be own'd was sensitive and surly | I |
| Yet 't is in vain such sallies to permit | F2 |
| They cannot quench young feelings fresh and early | I |
| I 'scotch'd not kill'd' the Scotchman in my blood | G2 |
| And love the land of 'mountain and of flood ' | - |
| - | |
| Don Juan who was real or ideal | H2 |
| For both are much the same since what men think | R |
| Exists when the once thinkers are less real | H2 |
| Than what they thought for mind can never sink | R |
| And 'gainst the body makes a strong appeal | H2 |
| And yet 'tis very puzzling on the brink | R |
| Of what is call'd eternity to stare | S |
| And know no more of what is here than there | S |
| - | |
| Don Juan grew a very polish'd Russian | B |
| How we won't mention why we need not say | E |
| Few youthful minds can stand the strong concussion | B |
| Of any slight temptation in their way | E |
| But his just now were spread as is a cushion | B |
| Smooth'd for a monarch's seat of honour gay | E |
| Damsels and dances revels ready money | I |
| Made ice seem paradise and winter sunny | I |
| - | |
| The favour of the empress was agreeable | D |
| And though the duty wax'd a little hard | I2 |
| Young people at his time of life should be able | D |
| To come off handsomely in that regard | I2 |
| He was now growing up like a green tree able | D |
| For love war or ambition which reward | J2 |
| Their luckier votaries till old age's tedium | K2 |
| Make some prefer the circulating medium | K2 |
| - | |
| About this time as might have been anticipated | G2 |
| Seduced by youth and dangerous examples | E |
| Don Juan grew I fear a little dissipated | L2 |
| Which is a sad thing and not only tramples | E |
| On our fresh feelings but as | E |
George Gordon Byron
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