An Essay On Death And A Prison Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCCCCCCDDEEEEFFCCFF CCCCFGEEHHGGFCIJKLCC FFEEMMEEFNEEGFCCOOCC EEEEFFPPCCCCCCCCCCQQ RRCCEECCGG| A prison is in all things like a grave | A |
| Where we no better priviledges have | B |
| Then dead men nor so good The soul once fled | C |
| Lives freer now then when she was cloystered | C |
| In walls of flesh and though she organs want | C |
| To act her swift designs yet all will grant | C |
| Her faculties more clear now separate | C |
| Then if the same conjunction which of late | C |
| Did marry her to earth had stood in force | D |
| Uncapable of death or of divorce | D |
| But an imprison'd mind though living dies | E |
| And at one time feels two captivities | E |
| A narrow dungeon which her body holds | E |
| But narrower body which her self enfolds | E |
| Whil'st I in prison ly nothing is free | F |
| Nothing enlarg'd but thought and miserie | F |
| Though e'ry chink be stopt the doors close barr'd | C |
| Despight of walls and locks through e'ry ward | C |
| These have their issues forth may take the aire | F |
| Though not for health but onely to compare | F |
| How wretched those men are who freedom want | C |
| By such as never suffer'd a restraint | C |
| In which unquiet travel could I find | C |
| Ought that might settle my distemper'd mind | C |
| Or of some comfort make discovery | F |
| It were a voyage well imploy'd but I | G |
| Like our raw travellers that cross the seas | E |
| To fetch home fashions or some worse disease | E |
| Instead of quiet a new torture bring | H |
| Home t'afflict me malice and murmuring | H |
| What is't I envy not no dog nor fly | G |
| But my desires prefer and wish were I | G |
| For they are free or if they were like me | F |
| They had no sense to know calamitie | C |
| But in the grave no sparks of envy live | I |
| No hot comparisons that causes give | J |
| Of quarrel or that our affections move | K |
| Any condition save their own to love | L |
| There are no objects there but shades and night | C |
| And yet that darkness better then the light | C |
| There lives a silent harmony no jar | F |
| Or discord can that sweet soft consort mar | F |
| The graves deaf ear is clos'd against all noise | E |
| Save that which rocks must hear the angels voice | E |
| Whose trump shall wake the world and raise up men | M |
| Who in earths bosom slept bed rid till then | M |
| What man then would who on deaths pillow slumbers | E |
| Be re inspir'd with life though golden numbers | E |
| Of bliss were pour'd into his breast though he | F |
| Were sure in change to gain a Monarchie | N |
| A Monarchs glorious state compar'd with his | E |
| Less safe less free less firm less quiet is | E |
| For nere was any Prince advanc't so high | G |
| That he was out of reach of misery | F |
| Never did story yet a law report | C |
| To banish fate or sorrow from his Court | C |
| Where ere he moves by land or through the Main | O |
| These go along sworn members of his train | O |
| But he whom the kind earth hath entertain'd | C |
| Hath in her womb a sanctuary gain'd | C |
| Whose charter and protection arm him so | E |
| That he is priviledg'd from future woe | E |
| The Coffin's a safe harbour where he rides | E |
| Land bound below cross windes or churlish tides | E |
| For grief sprung up with life was mans half brother | F |
| Fed by the taste brought forth by sin the mother | F |
| And since the first seduction of the wife | P |
| God did decree to grief a lease for life | P |
| Which Patent in full force continue must | C |
| Till man that disobey'd revert to dust | C |
| So that lifes sorrows ratifi'd by God | C |
| Cannot expire or find their period | C |
| Until the soul and body disunite | C |
| And by two diff'rent wayes from each take flight | C |
| But they dissolved once our woes disband | C |
| Th' assurance cancell'd by one fatall hand | C |
| Soon as the passing bell proclaims me dead | C |
| My sorrows sink with me lye buried | C |
| In the same heap of dust the self same Urn | Q |
| Doth them and me alike to nothing turn | Q |
| If then of these I might election make | R |
| Whether I would refuse and whether take | R |
| Rather then like a sullen Anchorite | C |
| I would live cas'd in stone and learn to write | C |
| A Prisoners story which might steal some tears | E |
| From the sad eyes of him that reads or hears | E |
| Give me a peaceful death and let me meet | C |
| My freedom seal'd up in my winding sheet | C |
| Death is the pledge of rest and with one bayl | G |
| Two Prisons quits the Body and the Jayl | G |
Henry King
(1)
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