The Charter; Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCD CCEEFFDD DDCCGHIJIIDDDDKKLLCC GHMMNNOODDCCNNDDPPDD QQDDNNJIRRSSDDDDTTDD UURRCCCCDDDDVVDDWWRR IIBBCCRRRRXXRRCCVVRR YYBBZZA2B2| ADDRESSED | A |
| TO MY NEPHEW | B |
| ATHANASE C L COQUEREL | C |
| ON HIS WEDDING DAY | D |
| - | |
| - | |
| CHILD of my heart while others hail | C |
| This festive morn when joys prevail | C |
| With careless wishes they may last | E |
| Spite of all annals of the past | E |
| As if for thee alone secure | F |
| Their fleeting nature would endure | F |
| With roses strewing all thy way | D |
| And life were but a bridal day | D |
| - | |
| For me by pensive thoughts opprest | D |
| The future fills my anxious breast | D |
| And flowers that fade and joys that flee | C |
| Are not the things I ask for thee | C |
| My heart for thee has learn'd to prove | G |
| The throbbings of a mother's love | H |
| Since on thy cradle fell the tear | I |
| That mourn'd a sister's early bier | J |
| And sure that angel's sainted prayer | I |
| Has shed sweet influence o'er my care | I |
| To sorrow doomed in all the rest | D |
| And only in her children blest | D |
| While now you sign with hope elate | D |
| The civic register of fate | D |
| Or at the holy altar bow | K |
| To ratify the plighted vow | K |
| Which made aright or breath'd amiss | L |
| Includes all future woe or bliss | L |
| While kneeling youth and weeping beauty | C |
| Hear the grave ritual of their duty | C |
| - | |
| And the stern rubrick well approve | G |
| That charges to be true to love | H |
| This compact that for ever binds | M |
| In holy links two kindred minds | M |
| Their happiness the mutual barter | N |
| This solemn league we'll call a CHARTER | N |
| Th' allusion never can be wrong | O |
| White omens to the name belong | O |
| Palladium that has all withstood | D |
| And harbinger of boundless good | D |
| And ever may its hallow'd law | C |
| Your willing hearts together draw | C |
| Ah may no ultra thirst of power | N |
| Embitter life's domestic hour | N |
| No principles of feudal sway | D |
| Teach without loving to obey | D |
| The heart such joyless homage slights | P |
| And wedlock claims its Bill of Rights | P |
| May you to Virtue nobly just | D |
| Disdain the whisper of mistrust | D |
| - | |
| Your truth her dark police may brave | Q |
| Made for the tyrant and the slave | Q |
| May Discord pass with sullen tread | D |
| Far from the threshold of your shed | D |
| With accents that on harshness border | N |
| And words that love would call to order | N |
| Or veto he would pine to hear | J |
| Protesting only by a tear | I |
| Nor when true fondness with submisison | R |
| Her right asserting of petition | R |
| Shall meekly hint at some abuse | S |
| Or some reform of gen'ral use | S |
| Unheeding all that she may say | D |
| Pass to the order of the day | D |
| Nor bidding every blessing fade | D |
| Let Jealousy your peace invade | D |
| Whose shadow clings to all that's dear | T |
| And adds the length'ning shapes of fear | T |
| Whose mind with sickly colours ting'd | D |
| Discerns in all the code infring'd | D |
| - | |
| Reads violations in the eye | U |
| And marks the treason of a sigh | U |
| Or loads a tear with false aspersion | R |
| Mistaking sorrow for aversion | R |
| Or construes into acts of guile | C |
| The tender pleadings of a smile | C |
| Condemns unheard with ultra fury | C |
| Nor suffers love to call a jury | C |
| Where innocence her head uprears | D |
| Safe in a trial by her peers | D |
| Thus having ne'er from duty swerved | D |
| The faith of treaties well observ'd | D |
| When Time your destin'd lot shall fling | V |
| Of sorrow from his loaded wing | V |
| For you of other good bereft | D |
| Unchanging love will still be left | D |
| Not like the world he then will roam | W |
| But rest the morning star of home | W |
| Not yours their bitter fate who know | R |
| That agony of lonely woe | R |
| - | |
| An altered heart was bound to share | I |
| Nor find defence nor charter there | I |
| For you to every duty true | B |
| The Charter held in rev'rence due | B |
| Each tender clause shall habit seal | C |
| With no suggestion of repeal | C |
| Firm to the law of true election | R |
| And treating change with stern rejection | R |
| Though time the graceful form has worn | R |
| To which fidelity was sworn | R |
| For not alone with blooming youth | X |
| Is made that league of lasting truth | X |
| The compact sign'd with beauty now | R |
| Includes wan age with wrinkled brow | R |
| With tresses grey with visage pale | C |
| And eyes whose liquid lustre fail | C |
| For then the hand that shrivell'd thing | V |
| Shall still display the nuptial ring | V |
| Pledge of your faith and cherish'd token | R |
| Of vows through lengthen'd years unbroken | R |
| - | |
| When all that's left of passion's flame | Y |
| Is friendship with a dearer name | Y |
| Thus be the charter'd Code imprest | B |
| With all its statutes on your breast | B |
| No duty it enjoins forsook | Z |
| Till Time at length shall close the book | Z |
| And hope shall frame for worlds to come | A2 |
| A treaty that survives the tomb | B2 |
Helen Maria Williams
(1)
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