At The Close Of A Course Of Lectures Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABB CCDD EEFF GGHH IIJJ KLGG MMNN OOPP QQHH| As the voice of the watch to the mariner's dream | A |
| As the footstep of Spring on the ice girdled stream | A |
| There comes a soft footstep a whisper to me | B |
| The vision is over the rivulet free | B |
| - | |
| We have trod from the threshold of turbulent March | C |
| Till the green scarf of April is hung on the larch | C |
| And down the bright hillside that welcomes the day | D |
| We hear the warm panting of beautiful May | D |
| - | |
| We will part before Summer has opened her wing | E |
| And the bosom of June swells the bodice of Spring | E |
| While the hope of the season lies fresh in the bud | F |
| And the young life of Nature runs warm in our blood | F |
| - | |
| It is but a word and the chain is unbound | G |
| The bracelet of steel drops unclasped to the ground | G |
| No hand shall replace it it rests where it fell | H |
| It is but one word that we all know too well | H |
| - | |
| Yet the hawk with the wildness untamed in his eye | I |
| If you free him stares round ere he springs to the sky | I |
| The slave whom no longer his fetters restrain | J |
| Will turn for a moment and look at his chain | J |
| - | |
| Our parting is not as the friendship of years | K |
| That chokes with the blessing it speaks through its tears | L |
| We have walked in a garden and looking around | G |
| Have plucked a few leaves from the myrtles we found | G |
| - | |
| But now at the gate of the garden we stand | M |
| And the moment has come for unclasping the hand | M |
| Will you drop it like lead and in silence retreat | N |
| Like the twenty crushed forms from an omnibus seat | N |
| - | |
| Nay hold it one moment the last we may share | O |
| I stretch it in kindness and not for my fare | O |
| You may pass through the doorway in rank or in file | P |
| If your ticket from Nature is stamped with a smile | P |
| - | |
| For the sweetest of smiles is the smile as we part | Q |
| When the light round the lips is a ray from the heart | Q |
| And lest a stray tear from its fountain might swell | H |
| We will seal the bright spring with a quiet farewell | H |
Oliver Wendell Holmes
(1)
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