Concerning Jesus Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: A BCCBBCCBDEDEFG A HIIHHIIHJBJKKB A LMMNNMMNBOBOMM P AQQAAQQAQQQQQQ P RBBRRBBRJQQEJE A SQQSSQQTUVVUUV A JQQJJQQJAWXAAX A QQQQQQQQPYPYZA2 E QQQQQQQQQB2QB2QB2 E QQQQQQQQEB2B2EQQ E EC2D2EEC2C2EWQWQEE E E2EEYYAEYQQF2F2KK E QQQQQQQQZAAZAZ A WEEWXEEXAG2G2YAY A EJJEEJJEQH2H2QQH2 A I2QQI2I2QQTJ2B2B2J2K 2K2 A AK2K2AAK2K2EL2B2M2B2 M2L2 A YB2B2YYB2B2YL2B2B2N2 L2N2

IA
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If thou hadst been a sculptor what a raceB
Of forms divine had thenceforth filled the landC
Methinks I see thee glorious workman standC
Striking a marble window through blind spaceB
Thy face's reflex on the coming faceB
As dawns the stone to statue 'neath thy handC
Body obedient to its soul's commandC
Which is thy thought informing it with graceB
So had it been But God who quickeneth clayD
Nor turneth it to marble maketh eyesE
Not shadowy hollows where no sunbeams playD
Would mould his loftiest thought in human guiseE
Thou didst appear walking unknown abroadF
God's living sculpture all informed of GodG
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IIA
-
If one should say Lo there thy statue takeH
Possession sculptor now inherit itI
Go forth upon the earth in likeness fitI
As with a trumpet cry at morning wakeH
The sleeping nations with light's terror shakeH
The slumber from their hearts that where they sitI
They leap straight up aghast as at a pitI
Gaping beneath I hear him answer makeH
Alas for me I cannot nor would dareJ
Inform what I revered as I did traceB
Who would be fool that he like fool might fareJ
With feeble spirit mocking the enormK
Strength on his forehead Thou God's thought thy formK
Didst live the large significance of thy faceB
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IIIA
-
Men have I seen and seen with wondermentL
Noble in form lift upward and divineM
In whom I yet must search as in a mineM
After that soul of theirs by which they wentN
Alive upon the earth And I have bentN
Regard on many a woman who gave signM
God willed her beautiful when he drew the lineM
That shaped each float and fold of beauty's tentN
Her soul alas chambered in pigmy spaceB
Left the fair visage pitiful inaneO
Poor signal only of a coming faceB
When from the penetrale she filled the faneO
Possessed of thee was every form of thineM
Thy very hair replete with the divineM
-
IVP
-
If thou hadst built a temple how my eyeA
Had hungering fed thereon from low browed cryptQ
Up to the soaring pinnacles that tiptQ
With stars gave signal when the sun drew nighA
Dark caverns in and under vivid skyA
Its home and aim Say from the glory sliptQ
And down into the shadows dropt and diptQ
Or reared from darkness up so holy highA
Thou build'st the temple of thy holy ghostQ
From hid foundation to high hidden fateQ
Foot in the grave head at the heavenly gateQ
From grave and sky filled with a fighting hostQ
Man is thy temple man thy work electQ
His glooms and glory thine great architectQ
-
VP
-
If thou hadst been a painter what fresh looksR
What outbursts of pent glories what new graceB
Had shone upon us from the great world's faceB
How had we read as in eternal booksR
The love of God in loneliest shiest nooksR
A lily in merest lines thy hand did traceB
Had plainly been God's child of lower raceB
And oh how strong the hills songful the brooksR
To thee all nature's meanings lie light bareJ
Because thy heart is nature's inner sideQ
Clear as to us earth on the dawn's gold tideQ
Her notion vast up in thy soul did riseE
Thine is the world thine all its splendours rareJ
Thou Man ideal with the unsleeping eyesE
-
VIA
-
But I have seen pictures the work of manS
In which at first appeared but chaos wildQ
So high the art transcended they beguiledQ
The eye as formless and without a planS
Not soon the spirit brooding o'er beganS
To see a purpose rise like mountain isledQ
When God said Let the Dry appear and piledQ
Above the waves it rose in twilight wanT
So might thy pictures then have been too strangeU
For us to pierce beyond their outmost lookV
A vapour and a darkness a sealed bookV
An atmosphere too high for wings to rangeU
And so we could but gazing pale and changeU
And tremble as at a void thought cannot brookV
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VIIA
-
But earth is now thy living picture whereJ
Thou shadowest truth the simple and profoundQ
By the same form in vital union boundQ
Where one can see but the first step of thy stairJ
Another sees it vanish far in airJ
When thy king David viewed the starry roundQ
From heart and fingers broke the psaltery soundQ
Lord what is man that thou shouldst mind his prayerJ
But when the child beholds the heavens on highA
He babbles childish noises not less dearW
Than what the king sang praying to the earX
Of him who made the child and king and skyA
Earth is thy picture painter great whose eyeA
Sees with the child sees with the kingly seerX
-
VIIIA
-
If thou hadst built some mighty instrumentQ
And set thee down to utter ordered soundQ
Whose faithful billows from thy hands unboundQ
Breaking in light against our spirits wentQ
And caught and bore above this earthly tentQ
The far strayed back to their prime natal groundQ
Where all roots fast in harmony are foundQ
And God sits thinking out a pure consentQ
Nay that thou couldst not that was not for theeP
Our broken music thou must first restoreY
A harder task than think thine own out freeP
And till thou hast done it no divinest scoreY
Though rendered by thine own angelic choirZ
Can lift one human spirit from the mireA2
-
IXE
-
If thou hadst been a poet On my heartQ
The thought flashed sudden burning through the weftQ
Of life and with too much I sank bereftQ
Up to my eyes the tears with sudden startQ
Thronged blinding then the veil would rend and partQ
The husk of vision would in twain be cleftQ
Thy hidden soul in naked beauty leftQ
I should behold thee Nature as thou artQ
O poet Jesus at thy holy feetQ
I should have lien sainted with listeningB2
My pulses answering ever in rhythmic beatQ
The stroke of each triumphant melody's wingB2
Creating as it moved my being sweetQ
My soul thy harp thy word the quivering stringB2
-
XE
-
Thee had we followed through the twilight landQ
Where thought grows form and matter is refinedQ
Back into thought of the eternal mindQ
Till seeing them one Lo in the morn we standQ
Then started fresh and followed hand in handQ
With sense divinely growing till combinedQ
We heard the music of the planets windQ
In harmony with billows on the strandQ
Till one with earth and all God's utteranceE
We hardly knew whether the sun outspakeB2
Or a glad sunshine from our spirits brakeB2
Whether we think or winds and blossoms danceE
Alas O poet leader for such goodQ
Thou wast God's tragedy writ in tears and bloodQ
-
XIE
-
Hadst thou been one of these in many eyesE
Too near to be a glory for thy sheenC2
Thou hadst been scorned and to the best hadst beenD2
A setter forth of strange divinitiesE
But to the few construct of harmoniesE
A sudden sun uplighting the sereneC2
High heaven of love and through the cloudy screenC2
That 'twixt our souls and truth all wretched liesE
Dawning at length hadst been a love and fearW
Worshipped on high from Magian's mountain crestQ
And all night long symbolled by lamp flames clearW
Thy sign a star upon thy people's breastQ
Where that strange arbitrary token liesE
Which once did scare the sun in noontide skiesE
-
XIIE
-
But as thou camest forth to bring the poorE2
Whose hearts are nearer faith and verityE
Spiritual childhood thy philosophyE
So taught'st the A B C of heavenly loreY
Because thou sat'st not lonely evermoreY
With mighty truths informing language highA
But walking in thy poem continuallyE
Didst utter deeds of all true forms the coreY
Poet and poem one indivisible factQ
Because thou didst thine own ideal actQ
And so for parchment on the human soulF2
Didst write thine aspirations at thy goalF2
Thou didst arrive with curses for acclaimK
And cry to God up through a cloud of shameK
-
XIIIE
-
For three and thirty years a living seedQ
A lonely germ dropt on our waste world's sideQ
Thy death and rising thou didst calmly bideQ
Sore companied by many a clinging weedQ
Sprung from the fallow soil of evil and needQ
Hither and thither tossed by friends deniedQ
Pitied of goodness dull and scorned of prideQ
Until at length was done the awful deedQ
And thou didst lie outworn in stony bowerZ
Three days asleep oh slumber godlike briefA
For man of sorrows and acquaint with griefA
Life seed thou diedst that Death might lose his powerZ
And thou with rooted stem and shadowy leafA
Rise of humanity the crimson flowerZ
-
XIVA
-
Where dim the ethereal eye no art though clearW
As golden star in morning's amber springsE
Can pierce the fogs of low imaginingsE
Painting and sculpture are a mockery mereW
Where dull to deafness is the hearing earX
Vain is the poet Nought but earthly thingsE
Have credence When the soaring skylark singsE
How shall the stony statue strain to hearX
Open the deaf ear wake the sleeping eyeA
And Lo musicians painters poets allG2
Trooping instinctive come without a callG2
As winds that where they list blow evermoreY
As waves from silent deserts roll to dieA
In mighty voices on the peopled shoreY
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XVA
-
Our ears thou openedst mad'st our eyes to seeE
All they who work in stone or colour fairJ
Or build up temples of the quarried airJ
Which we call music scholars are of theeE
Henceforth in might of such the earth shall beE
Truth's temple theatre where she shall wearJ
All forms of revelation all men bearJ
Tapers in acolyte humilityE
O master maker thy exultant artQ
Goes forth in making makers Pictures NoH2
But painters who in love and truth shall showH2
Glad secrets from thy God's rejoicing heartQ
Sudden green grass and waving corn up startQ
When through dead sands thy living waters goH2
-
XVIA
-
From the beginning good and fair are oneI2
But men the beauty from the truth will partQ
And though the truth is ever beauty's heartQ
After the beauty will short breathed runI2
And the indwelling truth deny and shunI2
Therefore in cottage synagogue and martQ
Thy thoughts came forth in common speech not artQ
With voice and eye in Jewish BabylonT
Thou taughtest not with pen or carved stoneJ2
Nor in thy hand the trembling wires didst takeB2
Thou of the truth not less than all wouldst makeB2
For Truth's sake even her forms thou didst disownJ2
Ere through the love of beauty truth shall failK2
The light behind shall burn the broidered veilK2
-
XVIIA
-
Holy of holies my bare feet draw nighA
Jesus thy body is the shining veilK2
By which I look on God nor grow death paleK2
I know that in my verses poor may lieA
Things low for see the thinker is not highA
But were my song as loud as saints' all hailK2
As pure as prophet's cry of warning wailK2
As holy as thy mother's ecstasyE
He sings a better who for love or ruthL2
Into his heart a little child doth takeB2
Nor thoughts nor feelings art nor wisdom sealM2
The man who at thy table bread shall breakB2
Thy praise was not that thou didst know or feelM2
Or show or love but that thou didst the truthL2
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XVIIIA
-
Despised Rejected by the priest led roarY
Of the multitude The imperial purple flungB2
About the form the hissing scourge had stungB2
Witnessing naked to the truth it boreY
True son of father true I thee adoreY
Even the mocking purple truthful hungB2
On thy true shoulders bleeding its folds amongB2
For thou wast king art king for evermoreY
I know the Father he knows me the truthL2
Truth witness therefore the one essential kingB2
With thee I die with thee live worshippingB2
O human God O brother eldest bornN2
Never but thee was there a man in soothL2
Never a true crown but thy crown of thornN2

George Macdonald



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