Laws Xiii Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A B C D A E F G H I H J I H K C L M F N E O P Q| Then a lawyer said But what of our Laws master | A |
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| And he answered | B |
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| You delight in laying down laws | C |
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| Yet you delight more in breaking them | D |
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| Like children playing by the ocean who build sand towers with constancy and then destroy them with laughter | A |
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| But while you build your sand towers the ocean brings more sand to the shore | E |
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| And when you destroy them the ocean laughs with you | F |
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| Verily the ocean laughs always with the innocent | G |
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| But what of those to whom life is not an ocean and man made laws are not sand towers | H |
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| But to whom life is a rock and the law a chisel with which they would carve it in their own likeness | I |
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| What of the cripple who hates dancers | H |
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| What of the ox who loves his yoke and deems the elk and deer of the forest stray and vagrant things | J |
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| What of the old serpent who cannot shed his skin and calls all others naked and shameless | I |
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| And of him who comes early to the wedding feast and when over fed and tired goes his way saying that all feasts are violation and all feasters law breakers | H |
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| What shall I say of these save that they too stand in the sunlight but with their backs to the sun | K |
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| They see only their shadows and their shadows are their laws | C |
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| And what is the sun to them but a caster of shadows | L |
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| And what is it to acknowledge the laws but to stoop down and trace their shadows upon the earth | M |
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| But you who walk facing the sun what images drawn on the earth can hold you | F |
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| You who travel with the wind what weathervane shall direct your course | N |
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| What man's law shall bind you if you break your yoke but upon no man's prison door | E |
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| What laws shall you fear if you dance but stumble against no man's iron chains | O |
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| And who is he that shall bring you to judgment if you tear off your garment yet leave it in no man's path | P |
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| People of Orphalese you can muffle the drum and you can loosen the strings of the lyre but who shall command the skylark not to sing | Q |
Khalil Gibran
(1)
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