Stella-s Birth-day. 1724-5 Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBCCDDEEFFGGHHIIJJ BBKKLLMMCCNNOPJJQRSS TTUUVVMMWWLLUU| As when a beauteous nymph decays | A |
| We say she's past her dancing days | A |
| So poets lose their feet by time | B |
| And can no longer dance in rhyme | B |
| Your annual bard had rather chose | C |
| To celebrate your birth in prose | C |
| Yet merry folks who want by chance | D |
| A pair to make a country dance | D |
| Call the old housekeeper and get her | E |
| To fill a place for want of better | E |
| While Sheridan is off the hooks | F |
| And friend Delany at his books | F |
| That Stella may avoid disgrace | G |
| Once more the Dean supplies their place | G |
| Beauty and wit too sad a truth | H |
| Have always been confined to youth | H |
| The god of wit and beauty's queen | I |
| He twenty one and she fifteen | I |
| No poet ever sweetly sung | J |
| Unless he were like Phoebus young | J |
| Nor ever nymph inspired to rhyme | B |
| Unless like Venus in her prime | B |
| At fifty six if this be true | K |
| Am I a poet fit for you | K |
| Or at the age of forty three | L |
| Are you a subject fit for me | L |
| Adieu bright wit and radiant eyes | M |
| You must be grave and I be wise | M |
| Our fate in vain we would oppose | C |
| But I'll be still your friend in prose | C |
| Esteem and friendship to express | N |
| Will not require poetic dress | N |
| And if the Muse deny her aid | O |
| To have them sung they may be said | P |
| But Stella say what evil tongue | J |
| Reports you are no longer young | J |
| That Time sits with his scythe to mow | Q |
| Where erst sat Cupid with his bow | R |
| That half your locks are turn'd to gray | S |
| I'll ne'er believe a word they say | S |
| 'Tis true but let it not be known | T |
| My eyes are somewhat dimmish grown | T |
| For nature always in the right | U |
| To your decays adapts my sight | U |
| And wrinkles undistinguished pass | V |
| For I'm ashamed to use a glass | V |
| And till I see them with these eyes | M |
| Whoever says you have them lies | M |
| No length of time can make you quit | W |
| Honour and virtue sense and wit | W |
| Thus you may still be young to me | L |
| While I can better hear than see | L |
| O ne'er may Fortune show her spite | U |
| To make me deaf and mend my sight | U |
Jonathan Swift
(1)
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