The Statesman's Secret - From Readings Over The Teacups - Five Stories And A Sequel Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABCDDEEFFGGHHIIAAJJ KKLLMMHHNNOOGPPJJQQR RSSTTUUVV FFBBFFFFOOWWXXYYZZ FFFFFF FF A2A2FFB2C2D2D2| Who of all statesmen is his country's pride | A |
| Her councils' prompter and her leaders' guide | A |
| He speaks the nation holds its breath to hear | B |
| He nods and shakes the sunset hemisphere | C |
| Born where the primal fount of Nature springs | D |
| By the rude cradles of her throneless kings | D |
| In his proud eye her royal signet flames | E |
| By his own lips her Monarch she proclaims | E |
| Why name his countless triumphs whom to meet | F |
| Is to be famous envied in defeat | F |
| The keen debaters trained to brawls and strife | G |
| Who fire one shot and finish with the knife | G |
| Tried him but once and cowering in their shame | H |
| Ground their hacked blades to strike at meaner game | H |
| The lordly chief his party's central stay | I |
| Whose lightest word a hundred votes obey | I |
| Found a new listener seated at his side | A |
| Looked in his eye and felt himself defied | A |
| Flung his rash gauntlet on the startled floor | J |
| Met the all conquering fought and ruled no more | J |
| See where he moves what eager crowds attend | K |
| What shouts of thronging multitudes ascend | K |
| If this is life to mark with every hour | L |
| The purple deepening in his robes of power | L |
| To see the painted fruits of honor fall | M |
| Thick at his feet and choose among them all | M |
| To hear the sounds that shape his spreading name | H |
| Peal through the myriad organ stops of fame | H |
| Stamp the lone isle that spots the seaman's chart | N |
| And crown the pillared glory of the mart | N |
| To count as peers the few supremely wise | O |
| Who mark their planet in the angels' eyes | O |
| If this is life | G |
| What savage man is he | P |
| Who strides alone beside the sounding sea | P |
| Alone he wanders by the murmuring shore | J |
| His thoughts as restless as the waves that roar | J |
| Looks on the sullen sky as stormy browed | Q |
| As on the waves yon tempest brooding cloud | Q |
| Heaves from his aching breast a wailing sigh | R |
| Sad as the gust that sweeps the clouded sky | R |
| Ask him his griefs what midnight demons plough | S |
| The lines of torture on his lofty brow | S |
| Unlock those marble lips and bid them speak | T |
| The mystery freezing in his bloodless cheek | T |
| His secret Hid beneath a flimsy word | U |
| One foolish whisper that ambition heard | U |
| And thus it spake Behold yon gilded chair | V |
| The world's one vacant throne thy plate is there | V |
| - | |
| Ah fatal dream What warning spectres meet | F |
| In ghastly circle round its shadowy seat | F |
| Yet still the Tempter murmurs in his ear | B |
| The maddening taunt he cannot choose but hear | B |
| Meanest of slaves by gods and men accurst | F |
| He who is second when he might be first | F |
| Climb with bold front the ladder's topmost round | F |
| Or chain thy creeping footsteps to the ground | F |
| Illustrious Dupe Have those majestic eyes | O |
| Lost their proud fire for such a vulgar prize | O |
| Art thou the last of all mankind to know | W |
| That party fights are won by aiming low | W |
| Thou stamped by Nature with her royal sign | X |
| That party hirelings hate a look like thine | X |
| Shake from thy sense the wild delusive dream | Y |
| Without the purple art thou not supreme | Y |
| And soothed by love unbought thy heart shall own | Z |
| A nation's homage nobler than its throne | Z |
| - | |
| - | |
| - | |
| Loud rang the plaudits with them rose the thought | F |
| Would he had learned the lesson he has taught | F |
| Used to the tributes of the noisy crowd | F |
| The stately speaker calmly smiled and bowed | F |
| The fire within a flushing cheek betrayed | F |
| And eyes that burned beneath their penthouse shade | F |
| - | |
| The clock strikes ten the hours are flying fast | F |
| Now Number Five we've kept you till the last | F |
| - | |
| What music charms like those caressing tones | A2 |
| Whose magic influence every listener owns | A2 |
| Where all the woman finds herself expressed | F |
| And Heaven's divinest effluence breathes confessed | F |
| Such was the breath that wooed our ravished ears | B2 |
| Sweet as the voice a dreaming vestal hears | C2 |
| Soft as the murmur of a brooding dove | D2 |
| It told the mystery of a mother's love | D2 |
Oliver Wendell Holmes
(1)
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