Persuasion Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: A B CBDB E EFGHGII JKJKLMLMN N OO PQPQRSRT U UU VWVWXEYEZA2ZA2BB YA2YA2B2BB2BC2JD2JE2 E2 F2 F2 G2UG2UH2I2H2I2H2H2 H2H2H2H2H2I2H2I2Z Z H2H2 I2 I2 J2I2J2I2K2 K2 H2 M L2 RBRBK2K2 H2 K2 K2 I2 I2K2 K2 RR H2 B B M2YM2YH2H2H2H2N2 H2 O2XO2XXK2XK2H2K2H2K2 BB

Then I asked 'Does a firm persuasion that a thing is so make it so 'A
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He replied 'All Poets believe that it does and in ages of imagination this firm persuasion removed mountains but many are not capable of a firm persuasion of anything '-
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Blake's 'Marriage of Heaven and Hell'B
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I-
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At any moment love unheraldedC
Comes and is king Then as with a fallB
Of frost the buds upon the hawthorn spreadD
Are withered in untimely burialB
So love occasion gone his crown puts by-
And as a beggar walks unfriended waysE
With but remembered beauty to defy-
The frozen sorrows of unsceptred daysE
Or in that later travelling he comesF
Upon a bleak oblivion and tellsG
Himself again again forgotten tombsH
Are all now that love was and blindly spellsG
His royal state of old a glory cursedI
Saying 'I have forgot' and that's the worstI
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II-
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If we should part upon that one embraceJ
And set our courses ever each from eachK
With all our treasure but a fading faceJ
And little ghostly syllables of speechK
Should beauty's moment never be renewedL
And moons on moons look out for us in vainM
And each but whisper from a solitudeL
To hear but echoes of a lonely painM
Still in a world that fortune cannot changeN
Should walk those two that once were you and I-
Those two that once when moon and stars were strangeN
Poets above us in an April sky-
Heard a voice falling on the midnight seaO
Mute and for ever but for you and meO
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III-
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This nature this great flood of life this cheatP
That uses us as baubles for her coatQ
Takes love that should be nothing but the beatP
Of blood for its own beauty by the throatQ
Saying you are my servant and shall doR
My purposes or utter bitternessS
Shall be your wage and nothing come to youR
But stammering tongues that never can confessT
Undaunted then in answer here I cry-
'You wanton that control the hand of himU
Who masquerades as wisdom in a sky-
Where holy holy sing the cherubimU
I will not pay one penny to your nameU
Though all my body crumble into shame '-
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IV-
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Woman I once had whimpered at your handV
Saying that all the wisdom that I soughtW
Lay in your brain that you were as the sandV
Should cleanse the muddy mirrors of my thoughtW
I should have read in you the characterX
Of oracles that quick a thousand laysE
Looked in your eyes and seen accounted thereY
Solomons legioned for bewildered praiseE
Now have I learnt love as love is I takeZ
Your hand and with no inquisition learnA2
All that your eyes can tell and that's to makeZ
A little reckoning and brief then turnA2
Away and in my heart I hear a callB
'I love I love I love' and that is allB
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V-
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When all the hungry pain of love I bearY
And in poor lightless thought but burn and burnA2
And wit goes hunting wisdom everywhereY
Yet can no word of revelation learnA2
When endlessly the scales of yea and nayB2
In dreadful motion fall and rise and fallB
When all my heart in sorrow I could payB2
Until at last were left no tear at allB
Then if with tame or subtle argumentC2
Companions come and draw me to a placeJ
Where words are but the tappings of contentD2
And life spreads all her garments with a graceJ
I curse that ease and hunger in my heartE2
Back to my pain and lonely to departE2
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VI-
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Not anything you do can make you mineF2
For enterprise with equal charity-
In duty as in love elect will shineF2
The constant slave of mutability-
Nor can your words for all their honey breathG2
Outsing the speech of many an older rhymeU
And though my ear deliver them from deathG2
One day or two it is so little timeU
Nor does your beauty in its excellenceH2
Excel a thousand in the daily sunI2
Yet must I put a period to pretenceH2
And with my logic's catalogue have doneI2
For act and word and beauty are but keysH2
To unlock the heart and you dear love are theseH2
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VII-
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Never the heart of spring had trembled soH2
As on that day when first in ParadiseH2
We went afoot as novices to knowH2
For the first time what blue was in the skiesH2
What fresher green than any in the grassH2
And how the sap goes beating to the sunI2
And tell how on the clocks of beauty passH2
Minute by minute till the last is doneI2
But not the new birds singing in the brakeZ
And not the buds of our discovery-
The deeper blue the wilder green the acheZ
For beauty that we shadow as we see-
Made heaven but we as love's occasion bringsH2
Took these and made them Paradisal thingsH2
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VIII-
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The lilacs offer beauty to the sunI2
Throbbing with wonder as eternally-
For sad and happy lovers they have doneI2
With the first bloom of summer in the sky-
Yet they are newly spread in honour nowJ2
Because for every beam of beauty givenI2
Out of that clustering heart back to the boughJ2
My love goes beating from a greater heavenI2
So be my love for good or sorry luckK2
Bound it has virtue on this April eve-
That shall be there for ever when they pluckK2
Lilacs for love And though I come to grieve-
Long at a frosty tomb there still shall be-
My happy lyric in the lilac tree-
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IXH2
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When they make silly question of my love-
And speak to me of danger and disdainM
And look by fond old argument to move-
My wisdom to docility againL2
When to my prouder heart they set the pride-
Of custom and the gossip of the street-
And show me figures of myself beside-
A self diminished at their judgment seat-
Then do I sit as in a drowsy pewR
To hear a priest expounding th' heavenly willB
Defiling wonder that he never knewR
With stolen words of measured good and illB
For to the love that knows their counsellingK2
Out of my love contempt alone I bringK2
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XH2
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Not love of you is most that I can bringK2
Since what I am to love you is the test-
And should I love you more than any thingK2
You would but be of idle love possessed-
A mere love wandering in appetite-
Counting your glories and yet bringing noneI2
Finding in you occasions of delight-
A thief of payment for no service doneI2
But when of labouring life I make a songK2
And bring it you as that were my reward-
To let what most is me to you belongK2
Then do I come of high possessions lord-
And loving life more than my love of youR
I give you love more excellently trueR
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XIH2
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What better tale could any lover tellB
When age or death his reckoning shall write-
Than thus 'Love taught me only to rebelB
Against these things the thieving of delight-
Without return the gospellers of fearM2
Who loving yet deny the truth they bearY
Sad suited lusts with lecherous hands to smearM2
The cloth of gold they would but dare not wearY
And love gave me great knowledge of the treesH2
And singing birds and earth with all her flowersH2
Wisdom I knew and righteousness in theseH2
I lived in their atonement all my hoursH2
Love taught me how to beauty's eye aloneN2
The secret of the lying heart is known '-
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XIIH2
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This then at last we may be wiser farO2
Than love and put his folly to our measureX
Yet shall we learn poor wizards that we areO2
That love chimes not nor motions at our pleasureX
We bid him come and light an eager fireX
And he goes down the road without debatingK2
We cast him from the house of our desireX
And when at last we leave he will be waitingK2
And in the end there is no folly but thisH2
To counsel love out of our little learningK2
For still he knows where rotten timber isH2
And where the boughs for the long winter burningK2
And when life needs no more of us at allB
Love's word will be the last that we recallB

John Drinkwater



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