Miriam Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCCDDEEFFGGHHIIJJKK LLMMNNOOPPQQRRSSBB TTUVWWXXYZA2A2BBB2B2 C2C2C2C2D2D2C2C2WWC2 C2C2C2E2E2F2F2G2G2H2 I2J2J2K2K2L2L2M2M2 EEBBN2N2I2M2O2B2P2Q2 C2C2R2R2 C2C2C2C2S2T2U2V2W2W2 X2X2C2C2C2C2C2C2C2C2 C2C2 Y2Z2C2C2C2C2A3A3B3B3 C2C2C3C3C2C2U2U2U2D3 D3E3E3U2U2U2U2BBF3F3 C2C2G3G3 U2U2MMU2U2C2C2U2U2H3 H3U2U2U2U2U2U2K2K2I3 I3U2U2J3J3W C2C2E3E3BBZZC2C2K3L3 II M3C2U2U2C2C2C2C2BBC2 C2C2C2 A3A3IIBBC2C2C2C2E3E3 XOne Sabbath day my friend and I | A |
After the meeting quietly | B |
Passed from the crowded village lanes | C |
White with dry dust for lack of rains | C |
And climbed the neighboring slope with feet | D |
Slackened and heavy from the heat | D |
Although the day was wellnigh done | E |
And the low angle of the sun | E |
Along the naked hillside cast | F |
Our shadows as of giants vast | F |
We reached at length the topmost swell | G |
Whence either way the green turf fell | G |
In terraces of nature down | H |
To fruit hung orchards and the town | H |
With white pretenceless houses tall | I |
Church steeples and o'ershadowing all | I |
Huge mills whose windows had the look | J |
Of eager eyes that ill could brook | J |
The Sabbath rest We traced the track | K |
Of the sea seeking river back | K |
Glistening for miles above its mouth | L |
Through the long valley to the south | L |
And looking eastward cool to view | M |
Stretched the illimitable blue | M |
Of ocean from its curved coast line | N |
Sombred and still the warm sunshine | N |
Filled with pale gold dust all the reach | O |
Of slumberous woods from hill to beach | O |
Slanted on walls of thronged retreats | P |
From city toil and dusty streets | P |
On grassy bluff and dune of sand | Q |
And rocky islands miles from land | Q |
Touched the far glancing sails and showed | R |
White lines of foam where long waves flowed | R |
Dumb in the distance In the north | S |
Dim through their misty hair looked forth | S |
The space dwarfed mountains to the sea | B |
From mystery to mystery | B |
- | |
So sitting on that green hill slope | T |
We talked of human life its hope | T |
And fear and unsolved doubts and what | U |
It might have been and yet was not | V |
And when at last the evening air | W |
Grew sweeter for the bells of prayer | W |
Ringing in steeples far below | X |
We watched the people churchward go | X |
Each to his place as if thereon | Y |
The true shekinah only shone | Z |
And my friend queried how it came | A2 |
To pass that they who owned the same | A2 |
Great Master still could not agree | B |
To worship Him in company | B |
Then broadening in his thought he ran | B2 |
Over the whole vast field of man | B2 |
The varying forms of faith and creed | C2 |
That somehow served the holders' need | C2 |
In which unquestioned undenied | C2 |
Uncounted millions lived and died | C2 |
The bibles of the ancient folk | D2 |
Through which the heart of nations spoke | D2 |
The old moralities which lent | C2 |
To home its sweetness and content | C2 |
And rendered possible to bear | W |
The life of peoples everywhere | W |
And asked if we who boast of light | C2 |
Claim not a too exclusive right | C2 |
To truths which must for all be meant | C2 |
Like rain and sunshine freely sent | C2 |
In bondage to the letter still | E2 |
We give it power to cramp and kill | E2 |
To tax God's fulness with a scheme | F2 |
Narrower than Peter's house top dream | F2 |
His wisdom and his love with plans | G2 |
Poor and inadequate as man's | G2 |
It must be that He witnesses | H2 |
Somehow to all men that He is | I2 |
That something of His saving grace | J2 |
Reaches the lowest of the race | J2 |
Who through strange creed and rite may draw | K2 |
The hints of a diviner law | K2 |
We walk in clearer light but then | L2 |
Is He not God are they not men | L2 |
Are His responsibilities | M2 |
For us alone and not for these | M2 |
- | |
And I made answer 'Truth is one | E |
And in all lands beneath the sun | E |
Whoso hath eyes to see may see | B |
The tokens of its unity | B |
No scroll of creed its fulness wraps | N2 |
We trace it not by school boy maps | N2 |
Free as the sun and air it is | I2 |
Of latitudes and boundaries | M2 |
In Vedic verse in dull Koran | O2 |
Are messages of good to man | B2 |
The angels to our Aryan sires | P2 |
Talked by the earliest household fires | Q2 |
The prophets of the elder day | C2 |
The slant eyed sages of Cathay | C2 |
Read not the riddle all amiss | R2 |
Of higher life evolved from this | R2 |
- | |
'Nor doth it lessen what He taught | C2 |
Or make the gospel Jesus brought | C2 |
Less precious that His lips retold | C2 |
Some portion of that truth of old | C2 |
Denying not the proven seers | S2 |
The tested wisdom of the years | T2 |
Confirming with his own impress | U2 |
The common law of righteousness | V2 |
We search the world for truth we cull | W2 |
The good the pure the beautiful | W2 |
From graven stone and written scroll | X2 |
From all old flower fields of the soul | X2 |
And weary seekers of the best | C2 |
We come back laden from our quest | C2 |
To find that all the sages said | C2 |
Is in the Book our mothers read | C2 |
And all our treasure of old thought | C2 |
In His harmonious fulness wrought | C2 |
Who gathers in one sheaf complete | C2 |
The scattered blades of God's sown wheat | C2 |
The common growth that maketh good | C2 |
His all embracing Fatherhood | C2 |
- | |
'Wherever through the ages rise | Y2 |
The altars of self sacrifice | Z2 |
Where love its arms has opened wide | C2 |
Or man for man has calmly died | C2 |
I see the same white wings outspread | C2 |
That hovered o'er the Master's head | C2 |
Up from undated time they come | A3 |
The martyr souls of heathendom | A3 |
And to His cross and passion bring | B3 |
Their fellowship of suffering | B3 |
I trace His presence in the blind | C2 |
Pathetic gropings of my kind | C2 |
In prayers from sin and sorrow wrung | C3 |
In cradle hymns of life they sung | C3 |
Each in its measure but a part | C2 |
Of the unmeasured Over Heart | C2 |
And with a stronger faith confess | U2 |
The greater that it owns the less | U2 |
Good cause it is for thankfulness | U2 |
That the world blessing of His life | D3 |
With the long past is not at strife | D3 |
That the great marvel of His death | E3 |
To the one order witnesseth | E3 |
No doubt of changeless goodness wakes | U2 |
No link of cause and sequence breaks | U2 |
But one with nature rooted is | U2 |
In the eternal verities | U2 |
Whereby while differing in degree | B |
As finite from infinity | B |
The pain and loss for others borne | F3 |
Love's crown of suffering meekly worn | F3 |
The life man giveth for his friend | C2 |
Become vicarious in the end | C2 |
Their healing place in nature take | G3 |
And make life sweeter for their sake | G3 |
- | |
'So welcome I from every source | U2 |
The tokens of that primal Force | U2 |
Older than heaven itself yet new | M |
As the young heart it reaches to | M |
Beneath whose steady impulse rolls | U2 |
The tidal wave of human souls | U2 |
Guide comforter and inward word | C2 |
The eternal spirit of the Lord | C2 |
Nor fear I aught that science brings | U2 |
From searching through material things | U2 |
Content to let its glasses prove | H3 |
Not by the letter's oldness move | H3 |
The myriad worlds on worlds that course | U2 |
The spaces of the universe | U2 |
Since everywhere the Spirit walks | U2 |
The garden of the heart and talks | U2 |
With man as under Eden's trees | U2 |
In all his varied languages | U2 |
Why mourn above some hopeless flaw | K2 |
In the stone tables of the law | K2 |
When scripture every day afresh | I3 |
Is traced on tablets of the flesh | I3 |
By inward sense by outward signs | U2 |
God's presence still the heart divines | U2 |
Through deepest joy of Him we learn | J3 |
In sorest grief to Him we turn | J3 |
And reason stoops its pride to share | W |
The child like instinct of a prayer ' | - |
- | |
And then as is my wont I told | C2 |
A story of the days of old | C2 |
Not found in printed books in sooth | E3 |
A fancy with slight hint of truth | E3 |
Showing how differing faiths agree | B |
In one sweet law of charity | B |
Meanwhile the sky had golden grown | Z |
Our faces in its glory shone | Z |
But shadows down the valley swept | C2 |
And gray below the ocean slept | C2 |
As time and space I wandered o'er | K3 |
To tread the Mogul's marble floor | L3 |
And see a fairer sunset fall | I |
On Jumna's wave and Agra's wall | I |
- | |
The good Shah Akbar peace be his alway | M3 |
Came forth from the Divan at close of day | C2 |
Bowed with the burden of his many cares | U2 |
Worn with the hearing of unnumbered prayers | U2 |
Wild cries for justice the importunate | C2 |
Appeals of greed and jealousy and hate | C2 |
And all the strife of sect and creed and rite | C2 |
Santon and Gouroo waging holy fight | C2 |
For the wise monarch claiming not to be | B |
Allah's avenger left his people free | B |
With a faint hope his Book scarce justified | C2 |
That all the paths of faith though severed wide | C2 |
O'er which the feet of prayerful reverence passed | C2 |
Met at the gate of Paradise at last | C2 |
- | |
He sought an alcove of his cool hareem | A3 |
Where far beneath he heard the Jumna's stream | A3 |
Lapse soft and low along his palace wall | I |
And all about the cool sound of the fall | I |
Of fountains and of water circling free | B |
Through marble ducts along the balcony | B |
The voice of women in the distance sweet | C2 |
And sweeter still of one who at his feet | C2 |
Soothed his tired ear with songs of a far land | C2 |
Where Tagus shatters on the salt sea sand | C2 |
The mirror of its cork grown hills of drouth | E3 |
And vales of vine at Lisbon's harbor mouth | E3 |
- | |
The date palms rustled no | X |
John Greenleaf Whittier
(1)
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