Freedom Xiv Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A B A C D E F G H I J K C L M N O P Q R A| And an orator said Speak to us of Freedom | A |
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| And he answered | B |
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| At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself and worship your own freedom | A |
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| Even as slaves humble themselves before a tyrant and praise him though he slays them | C |
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| Ay in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel I have seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a handcuff | D |
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| And my heart bled within me for you can only be free when even the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you and when you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfillment | E |
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| You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief | F |
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| But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound | G |
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| And how shall you rise beyond your days and nights unless you break the chains which you at the dawn of your understanding have fastened around your noon hour | H |
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| In truth that which you call freedom is the strongest of these chains though its links glitter in the sun and dazzle the eyes | I |
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| And what is it but fragments of your own self you would discard that you may become free | J |
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| If it is an unjust law you would abolish that law was written with your own hand upon your own forehead | K |
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| You cannot erase it by burning your law books nor by washing the foreheads of your judges though you pour the sea upon them | C |
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| And if it is a despot you would dethrone see first that his throne erected within you is destroyed | L |
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| For how can a tyrant rule the free and the proud but for a tyranny in their own freedom and a shame in their won pride | M |
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| And if it is a care you would cast off that care has been chosen by you rather than imposed upon you | N |
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| And if it is a fear you would dispel the seat of that fear is in your heart and not in the hand of the feared | O |
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| Verily all things move within your being in constant half embrace the desired and the dreaded the repugnant and the cherished the pursued and that which you would escape | P |
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| These things move within you as lights and shadows in pairs that cling | Q |
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| And when the shadow fades and is no more the light that lingers becomes a shadow to another light | R |
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| And thus your freedom when it loses its fetters becomes itself the fetter of a greater freedom | A |
Khalil Gibran
(1)
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