The Shepherds Calendar - May Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCCDDBBEEBBFFGGBBHI JJBBKKLLMMNNOOMMBBPP LLCCQQRRSSDDTTLLMMBB BBAAUUVVCCWXNNYYZZBB A2B2NNLLSSMMC2C2MMSS D2E2CCC2F2G2H2NNC2F2 LI2BBJ2J2K2K2L2L2DDD 2E2M2M2AABBN2D2BBAAB BBBBBSSBBBBO2O2BBNND DP2P2BBK2K2Q2Q2BBBBN 2D2F2C2R2R2S2S2BBMML 2L2T2T2NNBBO2O2O2O2P 2P2BBAAC2F2O2O2QQBBD U2EEBBBBMMV2W2O2O2BB BBNNC2C2EEW2P2| Come queen of months in company | A |
| Wi all thy merry minstrelsy | B |
| The restless cuckoo absent long | C |
| And twittering swallows chimney song | C |
| And hedge row crickets notes that run | D |
| From every bank that fronts the sun | D |
| And swathy bees about the grass | B |
| That stops wi every bloom they pass | B |
| And every minute every hour | E |
| Keep teazing weeds that wear a flower | E |
| And toil and childhoods humming joys | B |
| For there is music in the noise | B |
| The village childern mad for sport | F |
| In school times leisure ever short | F |
| That crick and catch the bouncing ball | G |
| And run along the church yard wall | G |
| Capt wi rude figured slabs whose claims | B |
| In times bad memory hath no names | B |
| Oft racing round the nookey church | H |
| Or calling ecchos in the porch | I |
| And jilting oer the weather cock | J |
| Viewing wi jealous eyes the clock | J |
| Oft leaping grave stones leaning hights | B |
| Uncheckt wi mellancholy sights | B |
| The green grass swelld in many a heap | K |
| Where kin and friends and parents sleep | K |
| Unthinking in their jovial cry | L |
| That time shall come when they shall lye | L |
| As lowly and as still as they | M |
| While other boys above them play | M |
| Heedless as they do now to know | N |
| The unconcious dust that lies below | N |
| The shepherd goes wi happy stride | O |
| Wi moms long shadow by his side | O |
| Down the dryd lanes neath blooming may | M |
| That once was over shoes in clay | M |
| While martins twitter neath his eves | B |
| Which he at early morning leaves | B |
| The driving boy beside his team | P |
| Will oer the may month beauty dream | P |
| And cock his hat and turn his eye | L |
| On flower and tree and deepning skye | L |
| And oft bursts loud in fits of song | C |
| And whistles as he reels along | C |
| Crack ing his whip in starts of joy | Q |
| A happy dirty driving boy | Q |
| The youth who leaves his corner stool | R |
| Betimes for neighbouring village school | R |
| While as a mark to urge him right | S |
| The church spires all the way in sight | S |
| Wi cheerings from his parents given | D |
| Starts neath the joyous smiles of heaven | D |
| And sawns wi many an idle stand | T |
| Wi bookbag swinging in his hand | T |
| And gazes as he passes bye | L |
| On every thing that meets his eye | L |
| Young lambs seem tempting him to play | M |
| Dancing and bleating in his way | M |
| Wi trembling tails and pointed ears | B |
| They follow him and loose their fears | B |
| He smiles upon their sunny faces | B |
| And feign woud join their happy races | B |
| The birds that sing on bush and tree | A |
| Seem chirping for his company | A |
| And all in fancys idle whim | U |
| Seem keeping holiday but him | U |
| He lolls upon each resting stile | V |
| To see the fields so sweetly smile | V |
| To see the wheat grow green and long | C |
| And list the weeders toiling song | C |
| Or short not e of the changing thrush | W |
| Above him in the white thorn bush | X |
| That oer the leaning stile bends low | N |
| Loaded wi mockery of snow | N |
| Mozzld wi many a lushing thread | Y |
| Of crab tree blossoms delicate red | Y |
| He often bends wi many a wish | Z |
| Oer the brig rail to view the fish | Z |
| Go sturting by in sunny gleams | B |
| And chucks in the eye dazzld streams | B |
| Crumbs from his pocket oft to watch | A2 |
| The swarming struttle come to catch | B2 |
| Them where they to the bottom sile | N |
| Sighing in fancys joy the while | N |
| Hes cautiond not to stand so nigh | L |
| By rosey milkmaid tripping bye | L |
| Where he admires wi fond delight | S |
| And longs to be there mute till night | S |
| He often ventures thro the day | M |
| At truant now and then to play | M |
| Rambling about the field and plain | C2 |
| Seeking larks nests in the grain | C2 |
| And picking flowers and boughs of may | M |
| To hurd awhile and throw away | M |
| Lurking neath bushes from the sight | S |
| Of tell tale eyes till schools noon night | S |
| Listing each hour for church clocks hum | D2 |
| To know the hour to wander home | E2 |
| That parents may not think him long | C |
| Nor dream of his rude doing wrong | C |
| Dreading thro the night wi dreaming pain | C2 |
| To meet his masters wand again | F2 |
| Each hedge is loaded thick wi green | G2 |
| And where the hedger late hath been | H2 |
| Tender shoots begin to grow | N |
| From the mossy stumps below | N |
| While sheep and cow that teaze the grain | C2 |
| will nip them to the root again | F2 |
| They lay their bill and mittens bye | L |
| And on to other labours hie | I2 |
| While wood men still on spring intrudes | B |
| And thins the shadow solitudes | B |
| Wi sharpend axes felling down | J2 |
| The oak trees budding into brown | J2 |
| Where as they crash upon the ground | K2 |
| A crowd of labourers gather round | K2 |
| And mix among the shadows dark | L2 |
| To rip the crackling staining bark | L2 |
| From off the tree and lay when done | D |
| The rolls in lares to meet the sun | D |
| Depriving yearly where they come | D2 |
| The green wood pecker of its home | E2 |
| That early in the spring began | M2 |
| Far from the sight of troubling man | M2 |
| And bord their round holes in each tree | A |
| In fancys sweet security | A |
| Till startld wi the woodmans noise | B |
| It wakes from all its dreaming joys | B |
| The blue bells too that thickly bloom | N2 |
| Where man was never feared to come | D2 |
| And smell smocks that from view retires | B |
| Mong rustling leaves and bowing briars | B |
| And stooping lilys of the valley | A |
| That comes wi shades and dews to dally | A |
| White beady drops on slender threads | B |
| Wi broad hood leaves above their heads | B |
| Like white robd maids in summer hours | B |
| Neath umberellas shunning showers | B |
| These neath the barkmens crushing treads | B |
| Oft perish in their blooming beds | B |
| Thus stript of boughs and bark in white | S |
| Their trunks shine in the mellow light | S |
| Beneath the green surviving trees | B |
| That wave above them in the breeze | B |
| And waking whispers slowly bends | B |
| As if they mournd their fallen friends | B |
| Each morning now the weeders meet | O2 |
| To cut the thistle from the wheat | O2 |
| And ruin in the sunny hours | B |
| Full many wild weeds of their flowers | B |
| Corn poppys that in crimson dwell | N |
| Calld 'head achs' from their sickly smell | N |
| And carlock yellow as the sun | D |
| That oer the may fields thickly run | D |
| And 'iron weed' content to share | P2 |
| The meanest spot that spring can spare | P2 |
| Een roads where danger hourly comes | B |
| Is not wi out its purple blooms | B |
| And leaves wi points like thistles round | K2 |
| Thickset that have no strength to wound | K2 |
| That shrink to childhoods eager hold | Q2 |
| Like hair and with its eye of gold | Q2 |
| And scarlet starry points of flowers | B |
| Pimpernel dreading nights and showers | B |
| Oft calld 'the shepherds weather glass' | B |
| That sleep till suns have dyd the grass | B |
| Then wakes and spreads its creeping bloom | N2 |
| Till clouds or threatning shadows come | D2 |
| Then close it shuts to sleep again | F2 |
| Which weeders see and talk of rain | C2 |
| And boys that mark them shut so soon | R2 |
| will call them 'John go bed at noon | R2 |
| And fumitory too a name | S2 |
| That superstition holds to fame | S2 |
| Whose red and purple mottled flowers | B |
| Are cropt by maids in weeding hours | B |
| To boil in water milk and way | M |
| For washes on an holiday | M |
| To make their beauty fair and sleak | L2 |
| And scour the tan from summers cheek | L2 |
| And simple small forget me not | T2 |
| Eyd wi a pinshead yellow spot | T2 |
| I'th' middle of its tender blue | N |
| That gains from poets notice due | N |
| These flowers the toil by crowds destroys | B |
| And robs them of their lowly joys | B |
| That met the may wi hopes as sweet | O2 |
| As those her suns in gardens meet | O2 |
| And oft the dame will feel inclind | O2 |
| As childhoods memory comes to mind | O2 |
| To turn her hook away and spare | P2 |
| The blooms it lovd to gather there | P2 |
| My wild field catalogue of flowers | B |
| Grows in my ryhmes as thick as showers | B |
| Tedious and long as they may be | A |
| To some they never weary me | A |
| The wood and mead and field of grain | C2 |
| I coud hunt oer and oer again | F2 |
| And talk to every blossom wild | O2 |
| Fond as a parent to a child | O2 |
| And cull them in my childish joy | Q |
| By swarms and swarms and never cloy | Q |
| When their lank shades oer morning pearls | B |
| Shrink from their lengths to little girls | B |
| And like the clock hand pointing one | D |
| Is turnd and tells the morning gone | U2 |
| They leave their toils for dinners hour | E |
| Beneath some hedges bramble bower | E |
| And season sweet their savory meals | B |
| Wi joke and tale and merry peals | B |
| Of ancient tunes from happy tongues | B |
| While linnets join their fitful songs | B |
| Perchd oer their heads in frolic play | M |
| Among the tufts of motling may | M |
| The young girls whisper things of love | V2 |
| And from the old dames hearing move | W2 |
| Oft making 'love knotts' in the shade | O2 |
| Of blue green oat or wheaten blade | O2 |
| And trying simple charms and spells | B |
| That rural superstition tells | B |
| They pull the little blossom threads | B |
| From out the knapweeds button heads | B |
| And put the husk wi many a smile | N |
| In their white bosoms for awhile | N |
| Who if they guess aright the swain | C2 |
| That loves sweet fancys trys to gain | C2 |
| Tis said that ere its lain an hour | E |
| Twill blossom wi a second flower | E |
| And from her white breasts hankerchief | W2 |
| Bloom as they ne'er | P2 |
John Clare
(1)
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About The Shepherds Calendar - May
The Shepherds Calendar - May is a poem by John Clare. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.
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