Cookmaid, Turnspit, And Ox Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BBCCDDEE DDFF GGAAHHIIJJKKLLMMNO PQRSTTUUVV IIIIIIIIWWQQQQII XXIIXXYBIIIIZZ WA2YYB2B2 C2C2To a Poor Man | A |
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Consider man in every sphere | B |
Then answer Is your lot severe | B |
Is God unjust You would be fed | C |
I grant you have to toil for bread | C |
Your wants are plainly to you known | D |
So every mortal feels his own | D |
Nor would I dare to say I knew | E |
'Midst men one happier man than you | E |
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Adam in Paradise was lone | D |
With Eve was first transgression known | D |
And thus they fell and thus disgrace | F |
Entailed the curse on human race | F |
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When Philip's son by glory fired | G |
The empire of the world desired | G |
He wept to find the course he ran | A |
Despite of altars was of man | A |
So avaricious hopes are checked | H |
And so proud man may lack respect | H |
And so ambition may be foiled | I |
Of the reward for which it moiled | I |
The wealthy surfeit of their wealth | J |
Grudging the ploughman's strength and health | J |
The man who weds the loveliest wife | K |
Weds with her loveliness much strife | K |
One wants an heir another rails | L |
Upon his heirs and the entails | L |
Another but can'st thou discern | M |
Envies and jealousies that burn | M |
Bid them avaunt and say you have | N |
Blessings unknown which others crave | O |
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Where is the turnspit Bob is gone | P |
And dinner must be drest by one | Q |
Where is that cur and I am loth | R |
To say that Betty swore an oath | S |
The sirloin's spoiled I'll give it him | T |
And Betty did look fierce and grim | T |
Bob who saw mischief in her eye | U |
Avoided her approaching nigh | U |
He feared the broomstick too with physics | V |
As dread as Betty's metaphysics | V |
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What star did at my birth preside | I |
That I should be born slave he sighed | I |
To tread that spit of horrid sound | I |
Inglorious task to which no hound | I |
That ever I knew was abased | I |
Whence is my line and lineage traced | I |
I would that I had been professed | I |
A lap dog by some dame caressed | I |
I would I had been born a spaniel | W |
Sagacious nostrilled and called Daniel | W |
I would I had been born a lion | Q |
Although I scorn a feline scion | Q |
I would I had been born of woman | Q |
And free from servitude as human | Q |
My lot had then been I discern fit | I |
And not as now a wretched turnspit | I |
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An ox replied who heard this whine | X |
Dare you at partial fate repine | X |
Behold me now beneath the goad | I |
And now beneath the waggon's load | I |
Now ploughing the tenacious plain | X |
And housing now the yellow grain | X |
Yet I without a murmur bear | Y |
These various labours of the year | B |
Yet come it will the day decreed | I |
By fates when I am doomed to bleed | I |
And you by duties of your post | I |
Must turn the spit when I must roast | I |
And to repay your currish moans | Z |
Will have the pickings of my bones | Z |
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The turnspit answered Superficial | W |
Has been my gaze on poor and rich all | A2 |
What do the mighty ones then bear | Y |
Their load of carking grief and care | Y |
And man perhaps ah goodness knows | B2 |
May have his share of pains and woes | B2 |
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So saying with contented look | C2 |
Bob wagged his tail and followed cook | C2 |
John Gay
(1)
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