The Cotton Boll Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABACDEBCFFGFAGGAHFIE IJJKKHHE LMNNLOMOPPQFRSFTSRTU IUIVWIWVFXYZZA2YB2C2 XC2D2E2D2E2F2G2F2G2G 2KH2KH2G2I2G2J2MK2MK 2G2L2G2L2 M2PPWN2N2M2M2O2P2P2Q 2WWM2R2R2S2Q2T2U2U2F FV2W2W2S2O2X2X2Y2Y2Z 2Z2A3B3B3A3AGGAT2C3T 2D3D3E3NF3E3G3DUUH3I 3G3P2P2J3J3A3K3A3L3L 3R2R2K3Z2Z2A3A3While I recline | A |
At ease beneath | B |
This immemorial pine | A |
Small sphere | C |
By dusky fingers brought this morning here | D |
And shown with boastful smiles | E |
I turn thy cloven sheath | B |
Through which the soft white fibres peer | C |
That with their gossamer bands | F |
Unite like love the sea divided lands | F |
And slowly thread by thread | G |
Draw forth the folded strands | F |
Than which the trembling line | A |
By whose frail help yon startled spider fled | G |
Down the tall spear grass from his swinging bed | G |
Is scarce more fine | A |
And as the tangled skein | H |
Unravels in my hands | F |
Betwixt me and the noonday light | I |
A veil seems lifted and for miles and miles | E |
The landscape broadens on my sight | I |
As in the little boll there lurked a spell | J |
Like that which in the ocean shell | J |
With mystic sound | K |
Breaks down the narrow walls that hem us round | K |
And turns some city lane | H |
Into the restless main | H |
With all his capes and isles | E |
- | |
Yonder bird | L |
Which floats as if at rest | M |
In those blue tracts above the thunder where | N |
No vapors cloud the stainless air | N |
And never sound is heard | L |
Unless at such rare time | O |
When from the City of the Blest | M |
Rings down some golden chime | O |
Sees not from his high place | P |
So vast a cirque of summer space | P |
As widens round me in one mighty field | Q |
Which rimmed by seas and sands | F |
Doth hail its earliest daylight in the beams | R |
Of gray Atlantic dawns | S |
And broad as realms made up of many lands | F |
Is lost afar | T |
Behind the crimson hills and purple lawns | S |
Of sunset among plains which roll their streams | R |
Against the Evening Star | T |
And lo | U |
To the remotest point of sight | I |
Although I gaze upon no waste of snow | U |
The endless field is white | I |
And the whole landscape glows | V |
For many a shining league away | W |
With such accumulated light | I |
As Polar lands would flash beneath a tropic day | W |
Nor lack there for the vision grows | V |
And the small charm within my hands | F |
More potent even than the fabled one | X |
Which oped whatever golden mystery | Y |
Lay hid in fairy wood or magic vale | Z |
The curious ointment of the Arabian tale | Z |
Beyond all mortal sense | A2 |
Doth stretch my sight's horizon and I see | Y |
Beneath its simple influence | B2 |
As if with Uriel's crown | C2 |
I stood in some great temple of the Sun | X |
And looked as Uriel down | C2 |
Nor lack there pastures rich and fields all green | D2 |
With all the common gifts of God | E2 |
For temperate airs and torrid sheen | D2 |
Weave Edens of the sod | E2 |
Through lands which look one sea of billowy gold | F2 |
Broad rivers wind their devious ways | G2 |
A hundred isles in their embraces fold | F2 |
A hundred luminous bays | G2 |
And through yon purple haze | G2 |
Vast mountains lift their plumed peaks cloud crowned | K |
And save where up their sides the ploughman creeps | H2 |
An unhewn forest girds them grandly round | K |
In whose dark shades a future navy sleeps | H2 |
Ye Stars which though unseen yet with me gaze | G2 |
Upon this loveliest fragment of the earth | I2 |
Thou Sun that kindlest all thy gentlest rays | G2 |
Above it as to light a favorite hearth | J2 |
Ye Clouds that in your temples in the West | M |
See nothing brighter than its humblest flowers | K2 |
And you ye Winds that on the ocean's breast | M |
Are kissed to coolness ere ye reach its bowers | K2 |
Bear witness with me in my song of praise | G2 |
And tell the world that since the world began | L2 |
No fairer land hath fired a poet's lays | G2 |
Or given a home to man | L2 |
- | |
But these are charms already widely blown | M2 |
His be the meed whose pencil's trace | P |
Hath touched our very swamps with grace | P |
And round whose tuneful way | W |
All Southern laurels bloom | N2 |
The Poet of 'The Woodlands' unto whom | N2 |
Alike are known | M2 |
The flute's low breathing and the trumpet's tone | M2 |
And the soft west wind's sighs | O2 |
But who shall utter all the debt | P2 |
O Land wherein all powers are met | P2 |
That bind a people's heart | Q2 |
The world doth owe thee at this day | W |
And which it never can repay | W |
Yet scarcely deigns to own | M2 |
Where sleeps the poet who shall fitly sing | R2 |
The source wherefrom doth spring | R2 |
That mighty commerce which confined | S2 |
To the mean channels of no selfish mart | Q2 |
Goes out to every shore | T2 |
Of this broad earth and throngs the sea with ships | U2 |
That bear no thunders hushes hungry lips | U2 |
In alien lands | F |
Joins with a delicate web remotest strands | F |
And gladdening rich and poor | V2 |
Doth gild Parisian domes | W2 |
Or feed the cottage smoke of English homes | W2 |
And only bounds its blessings by mankind | S2 |
In offices like these thy mission lies | O2 |
My Country and it shall not end | X2 |
As long as rain shall fall and Heaven bend | X2 |
In blue above thee though thy foes be hard | Y2 |
And cruel as their weapons it shall guard | Y2 |
Thy hearth stones as a bulwark make thee great | Z2 |
In white and bloodless state | Z2 |
And haply as the years increase | A3 |
Still working through its humbler reach | B3 |
With that large wisdom which the ages teach | B3 |
Revive the half dead dream of universal peace | A3 |
As men who labor in that mine | A |
Of Cornwall hollowed out beneath the bed | G |
Of ocean when a storm rolls overhead | G |
Hear the dull booming of the world of brine | A |
Above them and a mighty muffled roar | T2 |
Of winds and waters yet toil calmly on | C3 |
And split the rock and pile the massive ore | T2 |
Or carve a niche or shape the arch 'ed roof | D3 |
So I as calmly weave my woof | D3 |
Of song chanting the days to come | E3 |
Unsilenced though the quiet summer air | N |
Stirs with the bruit of battles and each dawn | F3 |
Wakes from its starry silence to the hum | E3 |
Of many gathering armies Still | G3 |
In that we sometimes hear | D |
Upon the Northern winds the voice of woe | U |
Not wholly drowned in triumph though I know | U |
The end must crown us and a few brief years | H3 |
Dry all our tears | I3 |
I may not sing too gladly To Thy will | G3 |
Resigned O Lord we cannot all forget | P2 |
That there is much even Victory must regret | P2 |
And therefore not too long | J3 |
From the great burthen of our country's wrong | J3 |
Delay our just release | A3 |
And if it may be save | K3 |
These sacred fields of peace | A3 |
From stain of patriot or of hostile blood | L3 |
Oh help us Lord to roll the crimson flood | L3 |
Back on its course and while our banners wing | R2 |
Northward strike with us till the Goth shall cling | R2 |
To his own blasted altar stones and crave | K3 |
Mercy and we shall grant it and dictate | Z2 |
The lenient future of his fate | Z2 |
There where some rotting ships and crumbling quays | A3 |
Shall one day mark the Port which ruled the Western seas | A3 |
Henry Timrod
(1)
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