The Appeasement Of Demeter Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BCBCDDCB A EFEFGGFH A IJIJKKJJ JLJLMMLJ NONOPPON OOOOOOOO QRQRCCRQ STSTOOTS J OOOOOOOO J OUOU UO J OJOJOOJO J OVOVJJVO J FJFJWWJF OJOJOOJO JJJJ JJ OOOOXXOOI | A |
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Demeter devastated our good land | B |
In blackness for her daughter snatched below | C |
Smoke pillar or loose hillock was the sand | B |
Where soil had been to clasp warm seed and throw | C |
The wheat vine olive ripe to Summer's ray | D |
Now whether night advancing whether day | D |
Scarce did the baldness show | C |
The hand of man was a defeated hand | B |
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II | A |
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Necessity the primal goad to growth | E |
Stood shrunken Youth and Age appeared as one | F |
Like Winter Summer good as labour sloth | E |
Nor was there answer wherefore beamed the sun | F |
Or why men drew the breath to carry pain | G |
High reared the ploughshare broken lay the wain | G |
Idly the flax wheel spun | F |
Unridered starving lords were wasp and moth | H |
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III | A |
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Lean grassblades losing green on their bent flags | I |
Sang chilly to themselves lone honey bees | J |
Pursued the flowers that were not with dry bags | I |
Sole sound aloud the snap of sapless trees | J |
More sharp than slingstones on hard breastplates hurled | K |
Back to first chaos tumbled the stopped world | K |
Careless to lure or please | J |
A nature of gaunt ribs an earth of crags | J |
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IV | - |
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No smile Demeter cast the gloom she saw | J |
Well draped her direful musing for in gloom | L |
In thicker gloom deep down the cavern maw | J |
Her sweet had vanished liker unto whom | L |
And whose pale place of habitation mute | M |
She and all seemed where Seasons pledged for fruit | M |
Anciently gaped for bloom | L |
Where hand of man was as a plucked fowl's claw | J |
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V | - |
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The wrathful Queen descended on a vale | N |
That ere the ravished hour for richness heaved | O |
Iambe maiden of the merry tale | N |
Beside her eyed the once red cheeked green leaved | O |
It looked as if the Deluge had withdrawn | P |
Pity caught at her throat her jests were gone | P |
More than for her who grieved | O |
She could for this waste home have piped the wail | N |
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VI | - |
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Iambe her dear mountain rivulet | O |
To waken laughter from cold stones beheld | O |
A riven wheatfield cracking for the wet | O |
And seed like infant's teeth that never swelled | O |
Apeep up flinty ridges milkless round | O |
Teeth of the giants marked she where thin ground | O |
Rocky in spikes rebelled | O |
Against the hand here slack as rotted net | O |
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VII | - |
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The valley people up the ashen scoop | Q |
She beckoned aiming hopelessly to win | R |
Her Mistress in compassion of yon group | Q |
So pinched and wizened with their aged grin | R |
For lack of warmth to smile on mouths of woe | C |
White as in chalk outlining little O | C |
Dumb from a falling chin | R |
Young old alike half bent to make the hoop | Q |
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VIII | - |
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Their tongues of birds they wagged weak voiced as when | S |
Dark underwaters the recesses choke | T |
With cluck and upper quiver of a hen | S |
In grasp past peeking cry before the croak | T |
Relentlessly their gold haired Heaven their fount | O |
Bountiful of old days heard them recount | O |
This and that cruel stroke | T |
Nor eye nor ear had she for piteous men | S |
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IX | J |
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A figure of black rock by sunbeams crowned | O |
Through stormclouds where the volumed shades enfold | O |
An earth in awe before the claps resound | O |
And woods and dwellings are as billows rolled | O |
The barren Nourisher unmelted shed | O |
Death from the looks that wandered with the dead | O |
Out of the realms of gold | O |
In famine for her lost her lost unfound | O |
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X | J |
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Iambe from her Mistress tripped she raised | O |
The cattle call above the moan of prayer | U |
And slowly out of fields their fancy grazed | O |
Among the droves defiled a horse and mare | U |
The wrecks of horse and mare such ribs as view | - |
Seas that have struck brave ships ashore while through | - |
Shoots the swift foamspit bare | U |
They nodded and Demeter on them gazed | O |
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XI | J |
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Howbeit the season of the dancing blood | O |
Forgot was horse of mare yea mare of horse | J |
Reversed each head at either's flank they stood | O |
Whereat the Goddess in a dim remorse | J |
Laid hand on them and smacked and her touch pricked | O |
Neighing within at either's flank they licked | O |
Played on a moment's force | J |
At courtship withering to the crazy nod | O |
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XII | J |
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The nod was that we gather for consent | O |
And mournfully amid the group a dame | V |
Interpreting the thing in nature meant | O |
Her hands held out like bearers of the flame | V |
And nodded for the negative sideways | J |
Keen at her Mistress glanced Iambe rays | J |
From the Great Mother came | V |
Her lips were opened wide the curse was rent | O |
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XIII | J |
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She laughed since our first harvesting heard none | F |
Like thunder of the song of heart her face | J |
The dreadful darkness shook to mounted sun | F |
And peal on peal across the hills held chase | J |
She laughed herself to water laughed to fire | W |
Laughed the torrential laugh of dam and sire | W |
Full of the marrowy race | J |
Her laughter Gods was flesh on skeleton | F |
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XIV | - |
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The valley people huddled broke afraid | O |
Assured and taking lightning in the veins | J |
They puffed they leaped linked hands together swayed | O |
Unwitting happiness till golden rains | J |
Of tears in laughter laughter weeping smote | O |
Knowledge of milky mercy from that throat | O |
Pouring to heal their pains | J |
And one bold youth set mouth at a shy maid | O |
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XV | - |
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Iambe clapped to see the kindly lusts | J |
Inspire the valley people still on seas | J |
Like poplar tops relieved from stress of gusts | J |
With rapture in their wonderment but these | J |
Low homage being rendered ran to plough | - |
Fed by the laugh as by the mother cow | - |
Calves at the teats they tease | J |
Soon drove they through the yielding furrow crusts | J |
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XVI | - |
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Uprose the blade in green the leaf in red | O |
The tree of water and the tree of wood | O |
And soon among the branches overhead | O |
Gave beauty juicy issue sweet for food | O |
O Laughter beauty plumped and love had birth | X |
Laughter O thou reviver of sick Earth | X |
Good for the spirit good | O |
For body thou to both art wine and bread | O |
George Meredith
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