The Two Rivers Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABBAABBACDECDE FGDDGGDDGHIJHIJ FCKKCCKKCLMNLMN OKPPKKPPKQRKQRK| Slowly the hour hand of the clock moves round | A |
| So slowly that no human eye hath power | B |
| To see it move Slowly in shine or shower | B |
| The painted ship above it homeward bound | A |
| Sails but seems motionless as if aground | A |
| Yet both arrive at last and in his tower | B |
| The slumberous watchman wakes and strikes the hour | B |
| A mellow measured melancholy sound | A |
| Midnight the outpost of advancing day | C |
| The frontier town and citadel of night | D |
| The watershed of Time from which the streams | E |
| Of Yesterday and To morrow take their way | C |
| One to the land of promise and of light | D |
| One to the land of darkness and of dreams | E |
| - | |
| II | F |
| O River of Yesterday with current swift | G |
| Through chasms descending and soon lost to sight | D |
| I do not care to follow in their flight | D |
| The faded leaves that on thy bosom drift | G |
| O River of To morrow I uplift | G |
| Mine eyes and thee I follow as the night | D |
| Wanes into morning and the dawning light | D |
| Broadens and all the shadows fade and shift | G |
| I follow follow where thy waters run | H |
| Through unfrequented unfamiliar fields | I |
| Fragrant with flowers and musical with song | J |
| Still follow follow sure to meet the sun | H |
| And confident that what the future yields | I |
| Will be the right unless myself be wrong | J |
| - | |
| III | F |
| Yet not in vain O River of Yesterday | C |
| Through chasms of darkness to the deep descending | K |
| I heard thee sobbing in the rain and blending | K |
| Thy voice with other voices far away | C |
| I called to thee and yet thou wouldst not stay | C |
| But turbulent and with thyself contending | K |
| And torrent like thy force on pebbles spending | K |
| Thou wouldst not listen to a poet's lay | C |
| Thoughts like a loud and sudden rush of wings | L |
| Regrets and recollections of things past | M |
| With hints and prophecies of things to be | N |
| And inspirations which could they be things | L |
| And stay with us and we could hold them fast | M |
| Were our good angels these I owe to thee | N |
| - | |
| IV | O |
| And thou O River of To morrow flowing | K |
| Between thy narrow adamantine walls | P |
| But beautiful and white with waterfalls | P |
| And wreaths of mist like hands the pathway showing | K |
| I hear the trumpets of the morning blowing | K |
| I hear thy mighty voice that calls and calls | P |
| And see as Ossian saw in Morven's halls | P |
| Mysterious phantoms coming beckoning going | K |
| It is the mystery of the unknown | Q |
| That fascinates us we are children still | R |
| Wayward and wistful with one hand we cling | K |
| To the familiar things we call our own | Q |
| And with the other resolute of will | R |
| Grope in the dark for what the day will bring | K |
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
Submit Spanish Translation
Submit German Translation
Submit French Translation
Write your comment about The Two Rivers poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Best Poems of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow