Modern Love Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BCCBDEEDFGGHIJJI A KLLKMNNMOPPOQRST A UVVUWXXWYZZYA2B2B2A2 S C2D2D2C2E2F2F2E2G2H2 H2G2I2J2J2I2 S K2L2L2K2M2N2N2M2M2O2 O2M2P2M2M2P2 S Q2SSQ2R2E2E2R2S2K2K2 T2U2V2W2U2 S X2Y2Y2X2M2YYM2CQQCZ2 M2M2Z2 S A3B3B3A3C3D3D3C3E3OO E3F3M2M2F3 M2 M2SSM2G3 Y2 H3I3I3H3J3K3K3J3 M2 L3M3M3L3YM2M2YM3J3J3 M3M2E2E2M2 M2 M2N3N3M2ZM2M2ZO3M2M2 O3M2D3D3M2 M2 M2SI | A |
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By this he knew she wept with waking eyes | B |
That at his hand's light quiver by her head | C |
The strange low sobs that shook their common bed | C |
Were called into her with a sharp surprise | B |
And strangled mute like little gaping snakes | D |
Dreadfully venomous to him She lay | E |
Stone still and the long darkness flowed away | E |
With muffled pulses Then as midnight makes | D |
Her giant heart of Memory and Tears | F |
Drink the pale drug of silence and so beat | G |
Sleep's heavy measure they from head to feet | G |
Were moveless looking through their dead black years | H |
By vain regret scrawled over the blank wall | I |
Like sculptured effigies they might be seen | J |
Upon their marriage tomb the sword between | J |
Each wishing for the sword that severs all | I |
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II | A |
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It ended and the morrow brought the task | K |
Her eyes were guilty gates that let him in | L |
By shutting all too zealous for their sin | L |
Each sucked a secret and each wore a mask | K |
But oh the bitter taste her beauty had | M |
He sickened as at breath of poison flowers | N |
A languid humour stole among the hours | N |
And if their smiles encountered he went mad | M |
And raged deep inward till the light was brown | O |
Before his vision and the world forgot | P |
Looked wicked as some old dull murder spot | P |
A star with lurid beams she seemed to crown | O |
The pit of infamy and then again | Q |
He fainted on his vengefulness and strove | R |
To ape the magnanimity of love | S |
And smote himself a shuddering heap of pain | T |
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III | A |
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This was the woman what now of the man | U |
But pass him If he comes beneath a heel | V |
He shall be crushed until he cannot feel | V |
Or being callous haply till he can | U |
But he is nothing nothing Only mark | W |
The rich light striking out from her on him | X |
Ha what a sense it is when her eyes swim | X |
Across the man she singles leaving dark | W |
All else Lord God who mad'st the thing so fair | Y |
See that I am drawn to her even now | Z |
It cannot be such harm on her cool brow | Z |
To put a kiss Yet if I meet him there | Y |
But she is mine Ah no I know too well | A2 |
I claim a star whose light is overcast | B2 |
I claim a phantom woman in the Past | B2 |
The hour has struck though I heard not the bell | A2 |
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IV | S |
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All other joys of life he strove to warm | C2 |
And magnify and catch them to his lip | D2 |
But they had suffered shipwreck with the ship | D2 |
And gazed upon him sallow from the storm | C2 |
Or if Delusion came 'twas but to show | E2 |
The coming minute mock the one that went | F2 |
Cold as a mountain in its star pitched tent | F2 |
Stood high Philosophy less friend than foe | E2 |
Whom self caged Passion from its prison bars | G2 |
Is always watching with a wondering hate | H2 |
Not till the fire is dying in the grate | H2 |
Look we for any kinship with the stars | G2 |
Oh wisdom never comes when it is gold | I2 |
And the great price we pay for it full worth | J2 |
We have it only when we are half earth | J2 |
Little avails that coinage to the old | I2 |
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V | S |
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A message from her set his brain aflame | K2 |
A world of household matters filled her mind | L2 |
Wherein he saw hypocrisy designed | L2 |
She treated him as something that is tame | K2 |
And but at other provocation bites | M2 |
Familiar was her shoulder in the glass | N2 |
Through that dark rain yet it may come to pass | N2 |
That a changed eye finds such familiar sights | M2 |
More keenly tempting than new loveliness | M2 |
The 'What has been' a moment seemed his own | O2 |
The splendours mysteries dearer because known | O2 |
Nor less divine Love's inmost sacredness | M2 |
Called to him 'Come ' In his restraining start | P2 |
Eyes nurtured to be looked at scarce could see | M2 |
A wave of the great waves of Destiny | M2 |
Convulsed at a checked impulse of the heart | P2 |
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VI | S |
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It chanced his lips did meet her forehead cool | Q2 |
She had no blush but slanted down her eye | S |
Shamed nature then confesses love can die | S |
And most she punishes the tender fool | Q2 |
Who will believe what honours her the most | R2 |
Dead is it dead She has a pulse and flow | E2 |
Of tears the price of blood drops as I know | E2 |
For whom the midnight sobs around Love's ghost | R2 |
Since then I heard her and so will sob on | S2 |
The love is here it has but changed its aim | K2 |
O bitter barren woman what's the name | K2 |
The name the name the new name thou hast won | T2 |
Behold me striking the world's coward stroke | U2 |
That will I not do though the sting is dire | V2 |
Beneath the surface this while by the fire | W2 |
They sat she laughing at a quiet joke | U2 |
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VII | S |
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She issues radiant from her dressing room | X2 |
Like one prepared to scale an upper sphere | Y2 |
By stirring up a lower much I fear | Y2 |
How deftly that oiled barber lays his bloom | X2 |
That long shanked dapper Cupid with frisked curls | M2 |
Can make known women torturingly fair | Y |
The gold eyed serpent dwelling in rich hair | Y |
Awakes beneath his magic whisks and twirls | M2 |
His art can take the eyes from out my head | C |
Until I see with eyes of other men | Q |
While deeper knowledge crouches in its den | Q |
And sends a spark up is it true we are wed | C |
Yea filthiness of body is most vile | Z2 |
But faithlessness of heart I do hold worse | M2 |
The former it were not so great a curse | M2 |
To read on the steel mirror of her smile | Z2 |
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VIII | S |
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Yet it was plain she struggled and that salt | A3 |
Of righteous feeling made her pitiful | B3 |
Poor twisting worm so queenly beautiful | B3 |
Where came the cleft between us whose the fault | A3 |
My tears are on thee that have rarely dropped | C3 |
As balm for any bitter wound of mine | D3 |
My breast will open for thee at a sign | D3 |
But no we are two reed pipes coarsely stopped | C3 |
The God once filled them with his mellow breath | E3 |
And they were music till he flung them down | O |
Used used Hear now the discord loving clown | O |
Puff his gross spirit in them worse than death | E3 |
I do not know myself without thee more | F3 |
In this unholy battle I grow base | M2 |
If the same soul be under the same face | M2 |
Speak and a taste of that old time restore | F3 |
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IX | M2 |
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He felt the wild beast in him betweenwhiles | M2 |
So masterfully rude that he would grieve | S |
To see the helpless delicate thing receive | S |
His guardianship through certain dark defiles | M2 |
Had he not teeth to rend and hunger too | G3 |
But still he spared her Once 'Have you no fear ' | - |
He said 'twas dusk she in his grasp none near | Y2 |
She laughed 'No surely am I not with you ' | - |
And uttering that soft starry 'you ' she leaned | H3 |
Her gentle body near him looking up | I3 |
And from her eyes as from a poison cup | I3 |
He drank until the flittering eyelids screened | H3 |
Devilish malignant witch and oh young beam | J3 |
Of heaven's circle glory Here thy shape | K3 |
To squeeze like an intoxicating grape | K3 |
I might and yet thou goest safe supreme | J3 |
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X | M2 |
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But where began the change and what's my crime | L3 |
The wretch condemned who has not been arraigned | M3 |
Chafes at his sentence Shall I unsustained | M3 |
Drag on Love's nerveless body thro' all time | L3 |
I must have slept since now I wake Prepare | Y |
You lovers to know Love a thing of moods | M2 |
Not like hard life of laws In Love's deep woods | M2 |
I dreamt of loyal Life the offence is there | Y |
Love's jealous woods about the sun are curled | M3 |
At least the sun far brighter there did beam | J3 |
My crime is that the puppet of a dream | J3 |
I plotted to be worthy of the world | M3 |
Oh had I with my darling helped to mince | M2 |
The facts of life you still had seen me go | E2 |
With hindward feather and with forward toe | E2 |
Her much adored delightful Fairy Prince | M2 |
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XI | M2 |
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Out in the yellow meadows where the bee | M2 |
Hums by us with the honey of the Spring | N3 |
And showers of sweet notes from the larks on wing | N3 |
Are dropping like a noon dew wander we | M2 |
Or is it now or was it then for now | Z |
As then the larks from running rings pour showers | M2 |
The golden foot of May is on the flowers | M2 |
And friendly shadows dance upon her brow | Z |
What's this when Nature swears there is no change | O3 |
To challenge eyesight Now as then the grace | M2 |
Of heaven seems holding earth in its embrace | M2 |
Nor eyes nor heart has she to feel it strange | O3 |
Look woman in the West There wilt thou see | M2 |
An amber cradle near the sun's decline | D3 |
Within it featured even in death divine | D3 |
Is lying a dead infant slain by thee | M2 |
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XII | M2 |
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Not solely that the Future she destroys | M2 |
And the fair life | S |
George Meredith
(1)
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