The Song Of The Unsuccessful Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABAB CDCD EFEF GHGH IJIJ KLKM NONO PQPQ RSRS TUVU| We are the toilers from whom God barred | A |
| The gifts that are good to hold | B |
| We meant full well and we tried full hard | A |
| And our failures were manifold | B |
| - | |
| And we are the clan of those whose kin | C |
| Were a millstone dragging them down | D |
| Yea we had to sweat for our brother's sin | C |
| And lose the victor's crown | D |
| - | |
| The seeming able who all but scored | E |
| From their teeming tribe we come | F |
| What was there wrong with us O Lord | E |
| That our lives were dark and dumb | F |
| - | |
| The men ten talented who still | G |
| Strangely missed of the goal | H |
| Of them we are it seems Thy will | G |
| To harrow some in soul | H |
| - | |
| We are the sinners too whose lust | I |
| Conquered the higher claims | J |
| We sat us prone in the common dust | I |
| And played at the devil's games | J |
| - | |
| We are the hard luck folk who strove | K |
| Zealously but in vain | L |
| We lost and lost while our comrades throve | K |
| And still we lost again | M |
| - | |
| We are the doubles of those whose way | N |
| Was festal with fruits and flowers | O |
| Body and brain we were sound as they | N |
| But the prizes were not ours | O |
| - | |
| A mighty army our full ranks make | P |
| We shake the graves as we go | Q |
| The sudden stroke and the slow heartbreak | P |
| They both have brought us low | Q |
| - | |
| And while we are laying life's sword aside | R |
| Spent and dishonored and sad | S |
| Our epitaph this when once we have died | R |
| The weak lie here and the bad | S |
| - | |
| We wonder if this can be really the close | T |
| Life's fever cooled by death's trance | U |
| And we cry though it seem to our dearest of foes | V |
| God give us another chance | U |
Richard Burton
(1)
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