Captain Dobbin Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST BUOHVWOXYZA2B2C2AD2E 2F2EG2HXH2D2I2J2K2L2 M2N2EO2P2Q2R2O2O2S2O 2T2U2O2O2OO2O2V2W2HX 2O2O2O2Y2EZ2O2OOX2EA 3X2ONNO2O2O2O2O2O2EO 2X2B3B3B3O2O2X2O2X2O O2O2C3O2X2HO2NO2D2O2 X2O2X2D2O2O2X2D3X2HX 2X2X2O2X2O2NEE3X2OEE X2X2X2OO2OX2HX2X2O2X 2X2OEEOHX2EO2EO2O2F3 O2O2O2

CAPTAIN Dobbin having retired from the South SeasA
In the dumb tides of with a handful of shellsB
A few poisoned arrows a cask of pearlsC
And five thousand pounds in the colonial fundsD
Now sails the street in a brick villa 'Laburnum Villa'E
In whose blank windows the harbour hangsF
Like a fog against the glassG
Golden and smoky or stoned with a white glitterH
And boats go by suspended in the paneI
Blue Funnel Red Funnel Messageries MaritimesJ
Lugged down the port like sea beasts taken aliveK
That scrape their bellies on sharp sandsL
Of which particulars Captain Dobbin keepsM
A ledger sticky with inkN
Entries of time and weather state of the moonO
Nature of cargo and captain's nameP
For some mysterious and awful purposeQ
Never divulgedR
For at night when the stars mock themselves with lanternsS
So late the chimes blow loud and faintT
Like a hand shutting and unshutting over the bellsB
Captain Dobbin having observed from bedU
The lights like a great fiery snake of the ComorinO
Going to sea will note the hourH
For subsequent recording in his gazetteV
But the sea is really closer to him than thisW
Closer to him than a dead lovely womanO
For he keeps bits of it like old lettersX
Salt tied up in bundlesY
Or pressed flatZ
What you might call a lock of the sea's hairA2
So Captain Dobbin keeps his dwarfed mementoB2
His urn burial a chest of mummied wavesC2
Gales fixed in print and the sweet dangerous countriesA
Of shark and casuarina treeD2
Stolen and put in coloured mapsE2
Like a flask of seawater or a bottled shipF2
A schooner caught in a glass bottleE
But Captain Dobbin keeps them in booksG2
Crags of varnished leatherH
Pimply with gilt by learned marinersX
And masters of hydrostatics or the childish talesH2
Of simple heroes taken by Turks or dropsyD2
So nightly he sails from shelf to shelfI2
Or to the quadrants dangling with rusty screwsJ2
Or the hanging gardens of old chartsK2
So old they bear the authentic protractor linesL2
Traced in faint ink as fine as Chinese hairsM2
Over the flat and painted atlas leavesN2
His reading glass would trembleE
Over the fathoms pricked in tiny rowsO2
Water shelving to the coastP2
Quietly the bone rimmed lens would floatQ2
Till through the glass he felt the barb d rushR2
Of bubbles foaming spied the albicoresO2
The blue fined admirals heard the wind swallowed criesO2
Of planters running on the beachS2
Who filched their swags of yams and ambergrisO2
Birds' nests and sandalwood from pastures numbedT2
By the sun's yellow too meek for honest theftU2
But he less delicate robber climbed the wallsO2
Broke into dozing housesO2
Crammed with black bottles marish wineO
Crusty and salt corroded fading printsO2
Sparkle daubed almanacs and playing cardsO2
With rusty cannon left by the French outsideV2
Half buried in sandW2
Even to the castle of Queen PomareeH
In the Yankee's footsteps and found her throne room piledX2
With golden candelabras mildewed swordsO2
Guitars and fowling pieces tossed in heapsO2
With greasy cakes and flung down calabashesO2
Then Captain Dobbin's eyeY2
That eye of wild and wispy scudding blueE
Voluptuously prying would light upZ2
Like mica scratched by gully sunsO2
And he would be fearful to look uponO
And shattering in his conversationO
Nor would he tolerate the harmless chantyX2
No 'Shenandoah' or the dainty mewE
That landsmen offer in a silver dishA3
To Neptune sung to pianos in candlelightX2
Of these he spoke in scornO
For there was but one way of singing 'Stormalong'N
He said and that was not really singingN
But howling rather shrieked in the wind's jawsO2
By furious men not tinkled in drawing roomsO2
By lap dogs in clean shirtsO2
And at these wordsO2
The galleries of photographs men with rich beardsO2
Pea jackets and brass buttons with folded armsO2
Would scowl approval for they were shipmates tooE
Companions of no cruise by reading glassO2
But fellows of storm and honey from the pastX2
'The Charlotte Java ' 'B3
'Knuckle and Fred at Port au Prince 'B3
'William in his New Rig 'B3
Even that notorious scoundrel Captain BaggsO2
Who as all knew owed Dobbin Twenty PoundsO2
Lost at fair cribbage but he never paidX2
Or paid 'with the slack of the tops'l sheets'O2
As Captain Dobbin frequently expressed itX2
There were their faces grilled a trifle nowO
Cigar hued in various spotsO2
By the brown breath of sodium eating yearsO2
On quarter decks long burnt to the water's edgeC3
A resurrection of the dead by chemicalsO2
And the voyages they had madeX2
Their labours in a country of waterH
Were they not marked by inadequate linesO2
On charts tied up like skins in a rackN
Or his own Odysseys his lonely travelsO2
His trading days an autobiographyD2
Of angles and triangles and lozengesO2
Ruled tack by tack across the sheetX2
That with a single scratch expressed the starsO2
Merak and Alamak and AlpheratX2
The wind the moon the sun the clambering seaD2
Sails bleached with light salt in the eyesO2
Bamboos and Tahiti orangesO2
From some forgotten countless dayX2
One foundered day from a forgotten monthD3
A year sucked quietly from the bloodX2
Dead with the rest remembered by no moreH
Than a scratch on a dry chartX2
Or when the return grew too choking bitter sweetX2
And laburnum berries manifestly tossedX2
Beyond the window not the fabulous leavesO2
Of Hotoo or canoe tree or palmettoX2
There were the wanderings of other keelsO2
Magellan Bougainville and CookN
Who found no greater a memorialE
Than footprints over a lithographE3
For Cook he worshipped that captain with the sadX2
And fine white face who never lost a manO
Or flinched a peril and of BougainvilleE
He spoke with graceful courtesy as a rivalE
To whom the honours of the hunting fieldX2
Must be accorded Not so with the SpaniardX2
Sebastian Juan del Cano at whom he sneeredX2
Openly calling him a fool of fortuneO
Blown to a sailors' abbey by chance windsO2
And blindfold currents who slept in a fine cabinO
Blundered through five degrees of latitudeX2
Was bullied by mutineers a hundred moreH
And woke and found himself across the worldX2
Coldly in the windowX2
Like a fog rubbed up and down the glassO2
The harbour bony with mistX2
And ropes of water glittered and the blind tideX2
That crawls it knows not where nor for what gainO
Pushed its drowned shoulders against the wheelE
Against the wheel of the millE
Flowers rocked far downO
And white dead bodies that were anchored thereH
In marshes of spent lightX2
Blue Funnel Red FunnelE
The ships went over them and bells in engine roomsO2
Cried to their bowels of flaring oilE
And stokers groaned and sweated with burnt skinsO2
Clawed to their shovelsO2
But quietly in his roomF3
In his little cemetery of sweet essencesO2
With fond memorial stones and lines of graceO2
Captain Dobbin went on reading about the seaO2

Kenneth Slessor



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