The Wanderer Poem Rhyme Scheme

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John Masefield

The Wanderer Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

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All day they loitered by the resting ships	A
Telling their beauties over taking stock	B
At night the verdict left my messmate's lips	A
The Wanderer is the finest ship in dock	B
	-
I had not seen her but a friend since drowned	C
Drew her with painted ports low lovely lean	D
Saying The Wanderer clipper outward bound	C
The loveliest ship my eyes have ever seen	D
	-
Perhaps to morrow you will see her sail	E
She sails at sunrise but the morrow showed	F
No Wanderer setting forth for me to hail	E
Far down the stream men pointed where she rode	F
	-
Rode the great trackway to the sea dim dim	G
Already gone before the stars were gone	H
I saw her at the sea line's smoky rim	G
Grow swiftly vaguer as they towed her on	I
	-
Soon even her masts were hidden in the haze	J
Beyond the city she was on her course	K
To trample billows for a hundred days	J
That afternoon the northerner gathered force	K
	-
Blowing a small snow from a point of east	L
Oh fair for her we said to take her south	M
And in our spirits as the wind increased	L
We saw her there beyond the river mouth	M
	-
Setting her side lights in the wildering dark	N
To glint upon mad water while the gale	E
Roared like a battle snapping like a shark	N
And drunken seamen struggled with the sail	E
	-
While with sick hearts her mates put out of mind	O
Their little children left astern ashore	P
And the gale's gathering made the darkness' blind	O
Water and air one intermingled roar	P
	-
Then we forgot her for the fiddlers played	Q
Dancing and singing held our merry crew	R
The old ship moaned a little as she swayed	Q
It blew all night oh bitter hard it blew	R
	-
So that at midnight I was called on deck	S
To keep an anchor watch I heard the sea	T
Roar past in white procession filled with wreck	S
Intense bright stars burned frosty over me	T
	-
And the Greek brig beside us dipped and dipped	U
White to the muzzle like a half tide rock	B
Drowned to the mainmast with the seas she shipped	U
Her cable swivels clanged at every shock	B
	-
And like a never dying force the wind	O
Roared till we shouted with it roared until	V
Its vast virality of wrath was thinned	W
Had beat its fury breathless and was still	V
	-
By dawn the gale had dwindled into flaw	X
A glorious morning followed with my friend	Y
I climbed the fo'c's'le head to see we saw	X
The waters hurrying shoreward without end	Y
	-
Haze blotted out the river's lowest reach	Z
Out of the gloom the steamers passing by	A2
Called with their sirens hooting their sea speech	Z
Out of the dimness others made reply	A2
	-
And as we watched there came a rush of feet	B2
Charging the fo'c's'le till the hatchway shook	C2
Men all about us thrust their way or beat	B2
Crying Wanderer Down the river Look	C2
	-
I looked with them towards the dimness there	D2
Gleamed like a spirit striding out of night	E2
A full rigged ship unutterably fair	D2
Her masts like trees in winter frosty bright	E2
	-
Foam trembled at her bows like wisps of wool	F2
She trembled as she towed I had not dreamed	G2
That work of man could be so beautiful	H2
In its own presence and in what it seemed	G2
	-
So she is putting back again I said	I2
How white with frost her yards are on the fore	P
One of the men about me answer made	Q
That is not frost but all her sails are tore	P
	-
Torn into tatters youngster in the gale	E
Her best foul weather suit gone It was true	R
Her masts were white with rags of tattered sail	E
Many as gannets when the fish are due	R
	-
Beauty in desolation was her pride	J2
Her crowned array a glory that had been	K2
She faltered tow'rds us like a swan that died	J2
But altogether ruined she was still a queen	D
	-
Put back with all her sails gone went the word	L2
Then from her signals flying rumor ran	M2
The sea that stove her boats in killed her third	L2
She has been gutted and has lost a man	M2
	-
So as though stepping to a funeral march	N2
She passed defeated homewards whence she came	O2
Ragged with tattered canvas white as starch	N2
A wild bird that misfortune had made tame	O2
	-
She was refitted soon another took	C2
The dead man's office then the singers hove	P2
Her capstan till the snapping hawsers shook	C2
Out with a bubble at her bows she drove	P2
	-
Again they towed her seawards and again	Q2
We watching praised her beauty praised her trim	G
Saw her fair house flag flutter at the main	R2
And slowly saunter seawards dwindling dim	G
	-
And wished her well and wondered as she died	J2
How when her canvas had been sheeted home	S2
Her quivering length would sweep into her stride	J2
Making the greenness milky with her foam	S2
	-
But when we rose next morning we discerned	T2
Her beauty once again a shattered thing	U2
Towing to dock the Wanderer returned	T2
A wounded sea bird with a broken wing	U2
	-
A spar was gone her rigging's disarray	V2
Told of a worse disaster than the last	W2
Like draggled hair dishevelled hung the stay	V2
Drooping and beating on the broken mast	W2
	-
Half mast upon her flagstaff hung her flag	X2
Word went among us how the broken spar	Y2
Had gored her captain like an angry stag	X2
And killed her mate a half day from the bar	Y2
	-
She passed to dock along the top of flood	Z2
An old man near me shook his head and swore	P
Like a bad woman she has tasted blood	Z2
There'll be no trusting in her any more	P
	-
We thought it truth and when we saw her there	D2
Lying in dock beyond across the stream	A3
We would forget that we had called her fair	D2
We thought her murderess and the past a dream	A3
	-
And when she sailed again we watched in awe	B3
Wondering what bloody act her beauty planned	C3
What evil lurked behind the thing we saw	X
What strength there was that thus annulled man's hand	C3
	-
How next its triumph would compel man's will	V
Into compliance with external fate	D3
How next the powers would use her to work ill	V
On suffering men we had not long to wait	D3
	-
For soon the outcry of derision rose	E3
Here comes the Wanderer the expected cry	A2
Guessing the cause our mockings joined with those	E3
Yelled from the shipping as they towed her by	A2
	-
She passed us close her seamen paid no heed	F3
To what was called they stood a sullen group	G3
Smoking and spitting careless of her need	F3
Mocking the orders given from the poop	G3
	-
Her mates and boys were working her we stared	H3
What was the reason of this strange return	I3
This third annulling of the thing prepared	H3
No outward evil could our eyes discern	I3
	-
Only like one who having formed a plan	M2
Beyond the pitch of common minds she sailed	J3
Mocked and deserted by the common man	M2
Made half divine to me for having failed	J3
	-
We learned the reason soon below the town	K3
A stay had parted like a snapping reed	F3
Warning the men thought not to take her down	K3
They took the omen they would not proceed	F3
	-
Days passed before another crew would sign	L3
The Wanderer lay in dock alone unmanned	C3
Feared as a thing possessed by powers malign	L3
Bound under curses not to leave the land	C3
	-
But under passing Time fear passes too	R
That terror passed the sailors' hearts grew bold	M3
We learned in time that she had found a crew	R
And was bound out southwards as of old	M3
	-
And in contempt we thought A little while	N3
Will bring her back again dismantled spoiled	O3
It is herself she cannot change her style	N3
She has the habit now of being foiled	O3
	-
So when a ship appeared among the haze	J
We thought The Wanderer back again but no	P3
No Wanderer showed for many many days	J
Her passing lights made other waters glow	P3
	-
But we would oft think and talk of her	Q3
Tell newer hands her story wondering then	Q2
Upon what ocean she was Wanderer	Q3
Bound to the cities built by foreign men	Q2
	-
And one by one our little conclave thinned	W
Passed into ships and sailed and so away	V2
To drown in some great roaring of the wind	O
Wanderers themselves unhappy fortune's prey	V2
	-
And Time went by me making memory dim	G
Yet still I wondered if the Wanderer fared	H3
Still pointing to the unreached ocean's rim	G
Brightening the water where her breast was bared	H3
	-
And much in ports abroad I eyed the ships	A
Hoping to see her well remembered form	R3
Come with a curl of bubbles at her lips	A
Bright to her berth the sovereign of the storm	R3
	-
I never did and many years went by	A2
Then near a Southern port one Christmas Eve	S3
I watched a gale go roaring through the sky	A2
Making the cauldrons of clouds upheave	S3
	-
Then the wrack tattered and the stars appeared	T3
Millions of stars that seemed to speak in fire	Q3
A byre cock cried aloud that morning neared	T3
The swinging wind vane flashed upon the spire	U3
	-
And soon men looked upon a glittering earth	V3
Intensely sparkling like a world new born	W3
Only to look was spiritual birth	V3
So bright the raindrops ran along the thorn	W3
	-
So bright they were that one could almost pass	X3
Beyond their twinkling to the source and know	P3
The glory pushing in the blade of grass	X3
That hidden soul which makes the flowers grow	P3
	-
That soul was there apparent not revealed	Y3
Unearthly meanings covered every tree	T
That wet grass grew in an immortal field	Y3
Those waters fed some never wrinkled sea	T
	-
The scarlet berries in the hedge stood out	Z3
Like revelations but the tongue unknown	A4
Even in the brooks a joy was quick the trout	Z3
Rushed in a dumbness dumb to me alone	A4
	-
All of the valley was loud with brooks	B4
I walked the morning breasting up the fells	C4
Taking again lost childhood from the rooks	B4
Whose cawing came above the Christmas bells	C4
	-
I had not walked that glittering world before	P
But up the hill a prompting came to me	T
This line of upland runs along the shore	P
Beyond the hedgerow I shall see the sea	T
	-
And on the instant from beyond away	V2
The long familiar sound a ship's bell broke	D4
The hush below me in the unseen bay	V2
Old memories came that inner prompting spoke	D4
	-
And bright above the hedge a seagull's wings	E4
Flashed and were steady upon empty air	D2
A Power unseen I cried prepares these things	E4
Those are her bells the Wanderer is there	D2
	-
So hurrying to the hedge and looking down	K3
I saw a mighty bay's wind crinkled blue	R
Ruffling the image of a tranquill town	K3
With lapsing waters glimmering as they grew	R
	-
And near me in the road the shipping swung	F4
So stately and so still in such a great peace	G4
That like to drooping crests their colors hung	F4
Only their shadows trembled without cease	G4
	-
I did but glance upon these anchored ships	A
Even as my thought had told I saw her plain	R2
Tense like a supple athlete with lean hips	A
Swiftness at pause the Wanderer come again	Q2
	-
Come as of old a queen untouched by Time	H4
Resting the beauty that no seas could tire	Q3
Sparkling as though the midnight's rain were rime	H4
Like a man's thought transfigured into fire	Q3
	-
And as I looked one of her men began	M2
To sing some simple tune of Christmas day	V2
Among her crew the song spread man to man	M2
Until the singing rang across the bay	V2
	-
And soon in other anchored ships the men	Q2
Joined in the singing with clear throats until	V
The farm boy heard it up the windy glen	Q2
Above the noise of sheep bells on the hill	V
	-
Over the water came the lifted song	I4
Blind pieces in a mighty game we sing	U2
Life's battle is a conquest for the strong	I4
The meaning shows in the defeated thing	U2