Vestigia Quinque Retrorsum - An Academic Poem Poem Rhyme Scheme

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While fond sad memories all around us throng	A
Silence were sweeter than the sweetest song	A
Yet when the leaves are green and heaven is blue	B
The choral tribute of the grove is due	B
And when the lengthening nights have chilled the skies	C
We fain would hear the song bird ere be flies	C
And greet with kindly welcome even as now	D
The lonely minstrel on his leafless bough	D
	-
This is our golden year its golden day	E
Its bridal memories soon must pass away	E
Soon shall its dying music cease to ring	F
And every year must loose some silver string	F
Till the last trembling chords no longer thrill	G
Hands all at rest and hearts forever still	G
	-
A few gray heads have joined the forming line	H
We hear our summons Class of 'Twenty Nine	H
Close on the foremost and alas how few	B
Are these The Boys our dear old Mother knew	B
Sixty brave swimmers Twenty something more	I
Have passed the stream and reached this frosty shore	I
	-
How near the banks these fifty years divide	J
When memory crosses with a single stride	J
'T is the first year of stern Old Hickory 's rule	K
When our good Mother lets us out of school	K
Half glad half sorrowing it must be confessed	L
To leave her quiet lap her bounteous breast	L
Armed with our dainty ribbon tied degrees	M
Pleased and yet pensive exiles and A B 's	N
	-
Look back O comrades with your faded eyes	C
And see the phantoms as I bid them rise	C
Whose smile is that Its pattern Nature gave	O
A sunbeam dancing in a dimpled wave	O
KIRKLAND alone such grace from Heaven could win	P
His features radiant as the soul within	P
That smile would let him through Saint Peter's gate	Q
While sad eyed martyrs had to stand and wait	Q
Here flits mercurial Farrar standing there	R
See mild benignant cautious learned Ware	R
And sturdy patient faithful honest Hedge	S
Whose grinding logic gave our wits their edge	S
Ticknor with honeyed voice and courtly grace	T
And Willard larynxed like a double bass	U
And Channing with his bland superior look	V
Cool as a moonbeam on a frozen brook	V
	-
While the pale student shivering in his shoes	W
Sees from his theme the turgid rhetoric ooze	W
And the born soldier fate decreed to wreak	X
His martial manhood on a class in Greek	X
Popkin How that explosive name recalls	Y
The grand old Busby of our ancient halls	Y
Such faces looked from Skippon's grim platoons	Z
Such figures rode with Ireton's stout dragoons	Z
He gave his strength to learning's gentle charms	Z
But every accent sounded Shoulder arms	Z
	-
Names empty names Save only here and there	R
Some white haired listener dozing in his chair	R
Starts at the sound he often used to hear	A2
And upward slants his Sunday sermon ear	A2
And we our blooming manhood we regain	B2
Smiling we join the long Commencement train	B2
One point first battled in discussion hot	C2
Shall we wear gowns and settled We will not	C2
How strange the scene that noisy boy debate	Q
Where embryo speakers learn to rule the State	Q
This broad browed youth sedate and sober eyed	J
Shall wear the ermined robe at Taney's side	J
And he the stripling smooth of face and slight	D2
Whose slender form scarce intercepts the light	D2
Shall rule the Bench where Parsons gave the law	E2
And sphinx like sat uncouth majestic Shaw	E2
Ah many a star has shed its fatal ray	E
On names we loved our brothers where are they	E
	-
Nor these alone our hearts in silence claim	F2
Names not less dear unsyllabled by fame	F2
	-
How brief the space and yet it sweeps us back	G2
Far far along our new born history's track	G2
Five strides like this the sachem rules the land	H2
The Indian wigwams cluster where we stand	H2
	-
The second Lo a scene of deadly strife	I2
A nation struggling into infant life	I2
Not yet the fatal game at Yorktown won	J2
Where failing Empire fired its sunset gun	J2
LANGDON sits restless in the ancient chair	R
Harvard's grave Head these echoes heard his prayer	R
When from yon mansion dear to memory still	G
The banded yeomen marched for Bunker's Hill	G
Count on the grave triennial's thick starred roll	K2
What names were numbered on the lengthening scroll	K2
Not unfamiliar in our ears they ring	F
Winthrop Hale Eliot Everett Dexter Tyng	F
	-
Another stride Once more at 'twenty nine	H
GOD SAVE KING GEORGE the Second of his line	H
And is Sir Isaac living Nay not so	Z
He followed Flainsteed two short years ago	Z
And what about the little hump backed man	L2
Who pleased the bygone days of good Queen Anne	L2
What Pope another book he's just put out	M2
The Dunciad witty but profane no doubt	M2
	-
Where's Cotton Mather he was always here	A2
And so he would be but he died last year	N2
Who is this preacher our Northampton claims	Z
Whose rhetoric blazes with sulphureous flames	Z
And torches stolen from Tartarean mines	Z
Edwards the salamander of divines	Z
A deep strong nature pure and undefiled	M2
Faith firm as his who stabbed his sleeping child	M2
Alas for him who blindly strays apart	M2
And seeking God has lost his human heart	M2
Fall where they might no flying cinders caught	M2
These sober halls where WADSWORTH ruled and taught	M2
	-
One footstep more the fourth receding stride	M2
Leaves the round century on the nearer side	M2
GOD SAVE KING CHARLES God knows that pleasant knave	O
His grace will find it hard enough to save	O
Ten years and more and now the Plague the Fire	O2
Talk of all tongues at last begin to tire	O2
One fear prevails all other frights forgot	M2
White lips are whispering hark The Popish Plot	M2
Happy New England from such troubles free	P2
In health and peace beyond the stormy sea	P2
No Romish daggers threat her children's throats	Z
No gibbering nightmare mutters Titus Oates	Z
Philip is slain the Quaker graves are green	Q2
Not yet the witch has entered on the scene	Q2
Happy our Harvard pleased her graduates four	I
URIAN OAKES the name their parchments bore	I
	-
Two centuries past our hurried feet arrive	R2
At the last footprint of the scanty five	R2
Take the fifth stride our wandering eyes explore	I
A tangled forest on a trackless shore	I
Here where we stand the savage sorcerer howls	Z
The wild cat snarls the stealthy gray wolf prowls	Z
The slouching bear perchance the trampling moose	Z
Starts the brown squaw and scares her red pappoose	Z
At every step the lurking foe is near	N2
His Demons reign God has no temple here	A2
	-
Lift up your eyes behold these pictured walls	Z
Look where the flood of western glory falls	Z
Through the great sunflower disk of blazing panes	Z
In ruby saffron azure emerald stains	Z
With reverent step the marble pavement tread	M2
Where our proud Mother's martyr roll is read	M2
See the great halls that cluster gathering round	M2
This lofty shrine with holiest memories crowned	M2
See the fair Matron in her summer bower	O2
Fresh as a rose in bright perennial flower	O2
Read on her standard always in the van	L2
TRUTH the one word that makes a slave a man	L2
Think whose the hands that fed her altar fires	Z
Then count the debt we owe our scholar sires	Z
	-
Brothers farewell the fast declining ray	E
Fades to the twilight of our golden day	E
Some lesson yet our wearied brains may learn	S2
Some leaves perhaps in life's thin volume turn	S2
How few they seem as in our waning age	T2
We count them backwards to the title page	T2
Oh let us trust with holy men of old	M2
Not all the story here begun is told	M2
So the tired spirit waiting to be freed	M2
On life's last leaf with tranquil eye shall read	M2
By the pale glimmer of the torch reversed	M2
Not Finis but The End of Volume First	M2

Oliver Wendell Holmes

Vestigia Quinque Retrorsum - An Academic Poem Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

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