The Great Beech Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBB CCDDD EEFFF GGHHH IIGGG GGJJJ KKLMM KKGGG GGGGG GGGGG GGGGG NNGGG OOJJJ PPQQQ RRSST UUGGG VVNNW MLXXXWith heart disposed to memory let me stand | A |
Near this monarch and this minstrel of the land | A |
Now that Dian leans so lovely from her car | B |
Illusively brought near by seeming falsely far | B |
In yon illustrious summit sways the tangled evening star | B |
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From trembling towers of greenery there heaves | C |
In glorious curves a precipice of leaves | C |
Superbly rolls thy passionate voice along | D |
Withstander of the tempest grim and strong | D |
When at the wind's imperative thou burstest into song | D |
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Still must I love thy gentle music most | E |
Utterly innocent of challenge or of boast | E |
And playmate of the sun's adoring beam | F |
Close kindred to thy softer tremblings seem | F |
The sighs of her I covet when she kindles in a dream | F |
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Oft at thy branching altar have I knelt | G |
Searched for the secret and thy lesson spelt | G |
Before the athletes of the night had done | H |
Their starry toil and joyous beams had run | H |
To melt the ancient silversmith who loves the set of sun | H |
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When Spring was budding in my heart anew | I |
Thy prayer for foliage soared into the blue | I |
Within thy branches myriad children heard | G |
Pale were their lips and fingers as they stirred | G |
And promised leafiness enough to tempt thy favourite bird | G |
- | |
Quick was the wonder to amaze my sight | G |
Where stood the leafless suppliant towered a knight | G |
Green to the helm and touching lips with May | J |
Far on the hill the wheatstalks stopped from play | J |
To call across the valley love to leaves more fine than they | J |
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Then wert thou vocal hospitable king | K |
Safe in thy heart the birds were glad to sing | K |
For dove and stormcock to thy breast had come | L |
And at the perfect hour a moony foam | M |
And starlight fell upon the thrush that made thy bosom home | M |
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As gentle gatherer of the weary wing | K |
Happy to quaff from the eternal spring | K |
That damps the woodwren's feather swollen breast | G |
Thou lendest to my heart a deeper rest | G |
Working with priceless balm a miracle for thy guest | G |
- | |
On thee in green and sunshine greatly stoled | G |
Thy kindred of the undulating wold | G |
Obeisance as befits their stature spend | G |
Sweet is the embassy with wind for friend | G |
When lofty limes of Todenham Church their fragrant homage send | G |
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Rightly they worship Rightly comes the maid | G |
To look for love beneath thy bounteous shade | G |
Rightly as these the village children haste | G |
And with their sunburned fingers interlaced | G |
Fasten a living girdle round thy cool and stalwart waist | G |
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For games and grief thou hast an equal heart | G |
Giving to all petitioners the needed part | G |
Often I ask the shape of him who fled | G |
To drink of knowledge at the fountain head | G |
He pulses in the shadow as a fugitive from the dead | G |
- | |
Old noble of the county once we twain | N |
Beneath thy roof discoursed of bliss and pain | N |
And looking upward for the star Content | G |
Laughed deep at soul to watch the sunbeams sent | G |
In coveys glittering all along the field of firmament | G |
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If ever the travelled spirit can return | O |
Where once in earthly bliss 'twas proud to burn | O |
In hard won triumph over resolute clay | J |
'Tis here my friend shall fold his wings and stay | J |
To fill my unforgetting heart with tremulous holiday | J |
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The tryst is here Brother I shall not fail | P |
Whether in Summer's ripeness Winter's hail | P |
Come most in Autumn's sympathetic charms | Q |
When opal hazes touch the red roofed farms | Q |
And in the night the beech tree holds the red moon in his arms | Q |
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And tell me Brother if the shining plan | R |
Of resurrection chooses only man | R |
If every friend of plain and upland dies | S |
For I would have this turreted tree arise | S |
To lord it over beeches in the forest of Paradise | T |
- | |
Fast in the ample chamber of his bole | U |
There dwells perchance an unintelligible soul | U |
Destined to tower in some celestial wold | G |
Where you and I conversing as of old | G |
May watch the Alps of Heaven become as mountains made of gold | G |
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Or bend to watch how cunningly the earth | V |
Tangles our kin in webs of tears and mirth | V |
And soils them even as they fly the stain | N |
And seeing this may find that Heaven is vain | N |
To keep earth broken hearts from breaking in Heaven again | W |
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Till shines the hour when Home is truly Home | M |
With all the brave and dear familiars come | L |
Assembled ripely in the lustrous sheaf | X |
Of Love and radiant in divine relief | X |
From Joy that used to spoil the earth by whispering to Grief | X |
Norman Rowland Gale
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