The Fallen Elm Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABABBCCDBDEFEFEGHGEI EJBKKBKBLLMMNOPQRGRG EGEGSTSTUUVVWCXXCYZY ZOOA2B2A2B2C2EC2E| Old elm that murmured in our chimney top | A |
| The sweetest anthem autumn ever made | B |
| And into mellow whispering calms would drop | A |
| When showers fell on thy many coloured shade | B |
| And when dark tempests mimic thunder made | B |
| While darkness came as it would strangle light | C |
| With the black tempest of a winter night | C |
| That rocked thee like a cradle in thy root | D |
| How did I love to hear the winds upbraid | B |
| Thy strength without while all within was mute | D |
| It seasoned comfort to our hearts' desire | E |
| We felt that kind protection like a friend | F |
| And edged our chairs up closer to the fire | E |
| Enjoying comfort that was never penned | F |
| Old favourite tree thou'st seen time's changes lower | E |
| Though change till now did never injure thee | G |
| For time beheld thee as her sacred dower | H |
| And nature claimed thee her domestic tree | G |
| Storms came and shook thee many a weary hour | E |
| Yet stedfast to thy home thy roots have been | I |
| Summers of thirst parched round thy homely bower | E |
| Till earth grew iron still thy leaves were green | J |
| The children sought thee in thy summer shade | B |
| And made their playhouse rings of stick and stone | K |
| The mavis sang and felt himself alone | K |
| While in thy leaves his early nest was made | B |
| And I did feel his happiness mine own | K |
| Nought heeding that our friendship was betrayed | B |
| Friend not inanimate though stocks and stones | L |
| There are and many formed of flesh and bones | L |
| Thou owned a language by which hearts are stirred | M |
| Deeper than by a feeling clothed in word | M |
| And speakest now what's known of every tongue | N |
| Language of pity and the force of wrong | O |
| What cant assumes what hypocrites will dare | P |
| Speaks home to truth and shows it what they are | Q |
| I see a picture which thy fate displays | R |
| And learn a lesson from thy destiny | G |
| Self interest saw thee stand in freedom's ways | R |
| So thy old shadow must a tyrant be | G |
| Thou'st heard the knave abusing those in power | E |
| Bawl freedom loud and then oppress the free | G |
| Thou'st sheltered hypocrites in many a shower | E |
| That when in power would never shelter thee | G |
| Thou'st heard the knave supply his canting powers | S |
| With wrong's illusions when he wanted friends | T |
| That bawled for shelter when he lived in showers | S |
| And when clouds vanished made thy shade amends | T |
| With axe at root he felled thee to the ground | U |
| And barked of freedom O I hate the sound | U |
| Time hears its visions speak and age sublime | V |
| Hath made thee a disciple unto time | V |
| It grows the cant term of enslaving tools | W |
| To wrong another by the name of right | C |
| Thus came enclosure ruin was its guide | X |
| But freedom's cottage soon was thrust aside | X |
| And workhouse prisons raised upon the site | C |
| Een nature's dwellings far away from men | Y |
| The common heath became the spoiler's prey | Z |
| The rabbit had not where to make his den | Y |
| And labour's only cow was drove away | Z |
| No matter wrong was right and right was wrong | O |
| And freedom's bawl was sanction to the song | O |
| Such was thy ruin music making elm | A2 |
| The right of freedom was to injure thine | B2 |
| As thou wert served so would they overwhelm | A2 |
| In freedom's name the little that is mine | B2 |
| And there are knaves that brawl for better laws | C2 |
| And cant of tyranny in stronger power | E |
| Who glut their vile unsatiated maws | C2 |
| And freedom's birthright from the weak devour | E |
John Clare
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Write your comment about The Fallen Elm poem by John Clare
Lucia Haynes: Very moving and if you read it every day would be fair comment. I have only discovered this poem today and wish it had been in my old school poetry books. Being 72 years old, poetry was part of education mainly before age 11. Radio 4 mentioned The Fallen Elm by John Clare this morning.
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