The Sailor-boy Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABB CCDD EEAA FDBB EEEE GGHH IIII| Tis three years and a quarter since I left my own fireside | A |
| To go aboard a ship through love and plough the ocean wide | A |
| I crossed my native fields where the scarlet poppies grew | B |
| And the groundlark left his nest like a neighbour which I knew | B |
| - | |
| The pigeons from the dove cote cooed over the old lane | C |
| The crow flocks from the oakwood went flopping oer the grain | C |
| Like lots of dear old neighbours whom I shall see no more | D |
| They greeted me that morning I left the English shore | D |
| - | |
| The sun was just a rising above the heath of furze | E |
| And the shadows grow to giants that bright ball never stirs | E |
| There the shepherds lay with their dogs by their side | A |
| And they started up and barked as my shadow they espied | A |
| - | |
| A maid of early morning twirled her mop upon the moor | F |
| I wished her my farewell before she closed the door | D |
| My friends I left behind me for other places new | B |
| Crows and pigeons all were strangers as oer my head they flew | B |
| - | |
| Trees and bushes were all strangers the hedges and the lanes | E |
| The steeples and the houses and broad untrodden plains | E |
| I passed the pretty milkmaid with her red and rosy face | E |
| I knew not where I met her I was strange to the place | E |
| - | |
| At last I saw the ocean a pleasing sight to me | G |
| I stood upon the shore of a mighty glorious sea | G |
| The waves in easy motion went rolling on their way | H |
| English colours were a flying where the British squadron lay | H |
| - | |
| I left my honest parents the church clock and the village | I |
| I left the lads and lasses the labour and the tillage | I |
| To plough the briny ocean which soon became my joy | I |
| I sat and sang among the shrouds a lonely sailor boy | I |
John Clare
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
Submit Spanish Translation
Submit German Translation
Submit French Translation
Write your comment about The Sailor-boy poem by John Clare
Best Poems of John Clare