The Lament Of Tasso Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCCDDBEFGGFEHIJHKKB BLAMMNNOPOPQQ APRSPTTUUVVWWXXXAAYY ZA2A2A2A2B2B2HA2HA2C 2C2 AAA2D2A2D2A2A2B2B2A2 A2E2F2 KA2A2A2A2G2F2A2A2F2G 2F2MF2MMF2F2H2I2IJ2J 2I2IF2F2AAK2A2A2A2K2 KBA2A2A2A2A2L2L2M2L2 N2N2A2F2A2F2NNNA2A2K A2A2KF2F2NM2NJ2KKNA2 NA2N AO2A2O2A2F2F2A2F2F2A 2A2P2P2Q2A2NQ2A2NA2H KKHK AA2A2ANNANI | A |
Long years It tries the thrilling frame to bear | B |
And eagle spirit of a child of Song | C |
Long years of outrage calumny and wrong | C |
Imputed madness prison'd solitude | D |
And the mind's canker in its savage mood | D |
When the impatient thirst of light and air | B |
Parches the heart and the abhorred grate | E |
Marring the sunbeams with its hideous shade | F |
Works through the throbbing eyeball to the brain | G |
With a hot sense of heaviness and pain | G |
And bare at once Captivity display'd | F |
Stands scoffing through the never open'd gate | E |
Which nothing through its bars admits save day | H |
And tasteless food which I have eat alone | I |
Till its unsocial bitterness is gone | J |
And I can banquet like a beast of prey | H |
Sullen and lonely crouching in the cave | K |
Which is my lair and it may be my grave | K |
All this hath somewhat worn me and may wear | B |
But must be borne I stoop not to despair | B |
For I have battled with mine agony | L |
And made me wings wherewith to overfly | A |
The narrow circus of my dungeon wall | M |
And freed the Holy Sepulchre from thrall | M |
And revell'd among men and things divine | N |
And pour'd my spirit over Palestine | N |
In honour of the sacred war for Him | O |
The God who was on earth and is in heaven | P |
For He has strengthen'd me in heart and limb | O |
That through this sufferance I might be forgiven | P |
I have employ'd my penance to record | Q |
How Salem's shrine was won and how adored | Q |
- | |
II | A |
But this is o'er my pleasant task is done | P |
My long sustaining friend of many years | R |
If I do blot thy final page with tears | S |
Know that my sorrows have wrung from me none | P |
But thou my young creation my soul's child | T |
Which ever playing round me came and smiled | T |
And woo'd me from myself with thy sweet sight | U |
Thou too art gone and so is my delight | U |
And therefore do I weep and inly bleed | V |
With this last bruise upon a broken reed | V |
Thou too art ended what is left me now | W |
For I have anguish yet to bear and how | W |
I know not that but in the innate force | X |
Of my own spirit shall be found resource | X |
I have not sunk for I had no remorse | X |
Nor cause for such they call'd me mad and why | A |
O Leonora wilt not thou reply | A |
I was indeed delirious in my heart | Y |
To lift my love so loft as thou art | Y |
But still my frenzy was not of the mind | Z |
I knew my fault and feel my punishment | A2 |
Not less because I suffer it unbent | A2 |
That thou wert beautiful and I not blind | A2 |
Hath been the sin which shuts me from mankind | A2 |
But let them go or torture as they will | B2 |
My heart can multiply thine image still | B2 |
Successful love may sate itself away | H |
The wretched are the faithful 'tis their fate | A2 |
To have all feeling save the one decay | H |
And every passion into one dilate | A2 |
As rapid rivers into ocean pour | C2 |
But ours is fathomless and hath no shore | C2 |
- | |
III | A |
Above me hark the long and maniac cry | A |
Of minds and bodies in captivity | A2 |
And hark the lash and the increasing howl | D2 |
And the half inarticulate blasphemy | A2 |
There be some here with worse than frenzy foul | D2 |
Some who do still goad on the o'erlabour'd mind | A2 |
And dim the little light that's left behind | A2 |
With needless torture as their tyrant will | B2 |
Is wound up to the lust of doing ill | B2 |
With these and with their victims am I class'd | A2 |
'Mid sounds and sights like these long years have passed | A2 |
'Mid sounds and sights like these my life may close | E2 |
So let it be for then I shall repose | F2 |
- | |
IV | K |
I have been patient let me be so yet | A2 |
I had forgotten half I would forget | A2 |
But it revives oh I would it were my lot | A2 |
To be forgetful as I am forgot | A2 |
Feel I not wroth with those who bade me dwell | G2 |
In this vast lazar house of many woes | F2 |
Where laughter is not mirth nor thought the mind | A2 |
Nor words a language nor even men mankind | A2 |
Where cries reply to curses shrieks to blows | F2 |
And each is tortured in his separate hell | G2 |
For we are crowded in our solitudes | F2 |
Many but each divided by the wall | M |
Which echoes Madness in her babbling moods | F2 |
While all can hear none heed his neighbour's call | M |
None save that One the veriest wretch of all | M |
Who was not made to be the mate of these | F2 |
Nor bound between Distraction and Disease | F2 |
Feel I not wroth with those who placed me here | H2 |
Who have debased me in the minds of men | I2 |
Debarring me the usage of my own | I |
Blighting my life in best of its career | J2 |
Branding my thoughts as things to shun and fear | J2 |
Would I not pay them back these pangs again | I2 |
And teach them inward Sorrow's stifled groan | I |
The struggle to be calm and cold distress | F2 |
Which undermines our Stoical success | F2 |
No still too proud to be vindictive I | A |
Have pardon'd princes' insults and would die | A |
Yes Sister of my Sovereign for thy sake | K2 |
I week all bitterness from out my breast | A2 |
It hath no business where thou art a guest | A2 |
Thy brother hates but I can not detest | A2 |
Though pitiest not but I can not forsake | K2 |
- | |
V | K |
Look on a love which knows not to despair | B |
But all unquench'd is still my better part | A2 |
Dwelling deep in my shut and silent heart | A2 |
As dwells the gather'd lightning in its cloud | A2 |
Encompass'd with its dark and rolling shroud | A2 |
Till struck forth flies the all ethereal dart | A2 |
And thus at the collision of thy name | L2 |
The vivid thought still flashes through my frame | L2 |
And for a moment all things as they were | M2 |
Flit by me they are gone I am the same | L2 |
And yet my love without ambition grew | N2 |
I knew thy state my station and I knew | N2 |
A Princess was no love mate for a bard | A2 |
I told it not I breathed it not it was | F2 |
Sufficient to itself its own reward | A2 |
And if my eyes reveal'd it they alas | F2 |
Were punish'd by the silentness of thine | N |
And yet I did not venture to repine | N |
Thou wert to me a crystal girded shrine | N |
Worshipp'd at holy distance and around | A2 |
Hallow'd and meekly kiss'd the saintly ground | A2 |
Nor for thou wert a princess but that Love | K |
Had robed thee with a glory and array'd | A2 |
Thy lineaments in a beauty that dismay'd | A2 |
Oh not dismay'd but awed like One above | K |
And in that sweet severity there was | F2 |
A something which all softness did surpass | F2 |
I know not how thy genius master'd mine | N |
My star stood still before thee if it were | M2 |
Presumptuous thus to love without design | N |
That sad fatality hath cost me dear | J2 |
But thou art dearest still and I should be | K |
Fit for this cell which wrongs me but for thee | K |
The very love which lock'd me to my chain | N |
Hath lighten'd half its weight and for the rest | A2 |
Though heavy lent me vigour to sustain | N |
And look to thee with undivided breast | A2 |
And foil the ingenuity of Pain | N |
- | |
VI | A |
It is no marvel from my very birth | O2 |
My soul was drunk with love which did pervade | A2 |
And mingle with whate'er I saw on earth | O2 |
Of objects all inanimate I made | A2 |
Idols and out of wild and lonely flowers | F2 |
And rocks whereby they grew a paradise | F2 |
Where I did lay me down within the shade | A2 |
Of waving trees and dream'd uncounted hours | F2 |
Though I was chid for wandering and the Wise | F2 |
Shook their white aged heads o'er me and said | A2 |
Of such materials wretched men were made | A2 |
And such a truant boy would end in woe | P2 |
And that the only lesson was a blow | P2 |
And then they smote me and I did not weep | Q2 |
But cursed them in my heart and to my haunt | A2 |
Return'd and wept alone and dream'd again | N |
The visions which arise without a sleep | Q2 |
And with my years my soul began to pant | A2 |
With feelings of strange tumult and soft pain | N |
And the whole heart exhaled into One Want | A2 |
But undefined and wandering till the day | H |
I found the thing I sought and that was thee | K |
And then I lost my being all to be | K |
Absorb'd in thine the world was pass'd away | H |
Thou didst annihilate the earth to me | K |
- | |
VII | A |
I loved all Solitude but little thought | A2 |
To spend I know not what of life remote | A2 |
From all communion with existence save | A |
The maniac and his tyrant had I been | N |
Their fellow many years ere this had seen | N |
My mind like theirs corrupted to its grave | A |
But who hath seen | N |
George Gordon Byron
(1)
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