Development Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDDCECCFGHCIJKLCMC NCBCC COPQCRCSTU VCCWXYCCZC CA2LB2 CC2CCD2E2RF2CCG2 H2I2 J2CK2L2M2I2N2O2P2CCQ 2CR2CS2T2CM2U2V2W2 X2Y2CGZ2A3D2Y2O2B3CG C3GD3D3I2E2CD3M2 CD3D3D3CM2E3D3CF3M2My father was a scholar and knew Greek | A |
When I was five years old I asked him once | B |
What do you read about | C |
The siege of Troy | D |
What is a siege and what is Troy | D |
Whereat | C |
He piled up chairs and tables for a town | E |
Set me a top for Priam called our cat | C |
Helen enticed away from home he said | C |
By wicked Paris who couched somewhere close | F |
Under the footstool being cowardly | G |
But whom since she was worth the pains poor puss | H |
Towzer and Tray our dogs the Atreidai sought | C |
By taking Troy to get possession of | I |
Always when great Achilles ceased to sulk | J |
My pony in the stable forth would prance | K |
And put to flight Hector our page boy's self | L |
This taught me who was who and what was what | C |
So far I rightly understood the case | M |
At five years old a huge delight it proved | C |
And still proves thanks to that insructor sage | N |
My Father who knew better than turn straight | C |
Learning's full flare on weak eyed ignorance | B |
Or worse yet leave weak eyes to grow sand blind | C |
Content with darkness and vacuity | C |
- | |
It happened two or three years afterward | C |
That I and playmates playing at Troy' Siege | O |
My Father came upon our make believe | P |
How would you like to read yourself the tale | Q |
Properly told of which I gave you first | C |
Merely such notion as a boy could bear | R |
Pope now would give you the precise account | C |
Of what some day by dint of scholarship | S |
You'll hear who knows from Homer' very mouth | T |
Learn Greek by all means read the Blind Old Man | U |
Sweetest of Singers' tuphlos which means 'blind ' | - |
Hedistos which means 'sweetest ' Time enough | V |
Try anyhow to master him some day | C |
Until when take what serves for substitute | C |
Read Pope by all means | W |
So I ran through Pope | X |
Enjoyed the tale what history so true | Y |
Also attacked my Primer duly drudged | C |
Grew fitter thus for what was promised next | C |
The very thing itself the actual words | Z |
When I could turn say Buttmann to account | C |
- | |
Time passed I ripened somewhat one fine day | C |
Quite ready for the Iliad nothing less | A2 |
There's Heine where the big books block the shelf | L |
Don't skip a word thumb well the Lexicon | B2 |
- | |
I thumbed well and skipped nowise till I learned | C |
Who was who what was what from Homer's tongue | C2 |
And there an end of learning Had you asked | C |
The all accomplished scholar twelve years old | C |
Who was it wrote the Iliad what a laugh | D2 |
Why Homer all the world knows of his life | E2 |
Doubtless some facts exist it's everywhere | R |
We have not settled though his place of birth | F2 |
He begged for certain and was blind beside | C |
Seven cities claimed him Scio with best right | C |
Thinks Byron What he wrote Those Hymns we have | G2 |
Then there's the 'Battle of the Frogs and Mice ' | - |
That's all unless they dig 'Margites' up | H2 |
I'd like that nothing more remains to know | I2 |
- | |
Thus did youth spend a comfortable time | J2 |
Until What's this the Germans say in fact | C |
That Wolf found out first It's unpleasant work | K2 |
Their chop and change unsettling one's belief | L2 |
All the same where we live we learn that's sure | M2 |
So I bent brow o'er Prolegomena | I2 |
And after Wolf a dozen of his like | N2 |
Proved there was never any Troy at all | O2 |
Neither Besiegers nor Besieged nay worse | P2 |
No actual Homer no authentic text | C |
No warrant for the fiction I as fact | C |
Had treasured in my heart and soul so long | Q2 |
Ay mark you and as fact held still still hold | C |
Spite of new knowledge in my heart of hearts | R2 |
And soul of souls fact's essence freed and fixed | C |
From accidental fancy's guardian sheath | S2 |
Assuredly thenceforward thank my stars | T2 |
However it got there deprive who could | C |
Wring from the shrine my precious tenantry | M2 |
Helen Ulysses Hector and his Spouse | U2 |
Achilles and his Friend though Wolf ah Wolf | V2 |
Why must he needs come doubting spoil a dream | W2 |
- | |
But then No dream's worth waking Browning says | X2 |
And here's the reason why I tell thus much | Y2 |
I now mature man you anticipate | C |
May blame my Father justifiably | G |
For letting me dream out my nonage thus | Z2 |
And only by such slow and sure degrees | A3 |
Permitting me to sift the grain from chaff | D2 |
Get truth and falsehood known and named as such | Y2 |
Why did he ever let me dream at all | O2 |
Not bid me taste the story in its strength | B3 |
Suppose my childhood was scarce qualified | C |
To rightly understand mythology | G |
Silence at least was in his power to keep | C3 |
I might have somehow correspondingly | G |
Well who knows by what method gained my gains | D3 |
Been taught by forthrights not meanderings | D3 |
My aim should be to loathe like Peleus' son | I2 |
A lie as Hell's Gate love my wedded wife | E2 |
Like Hector and so on with all the rest | C |
Could not I have excogitated this | D3 |
Without believing such man really were | M2 |
- | |
That is he might have put into my hand | C |
The Ethics In translation if you please | D3 |
Exact no pretty lying that improves | D3 |
To suit the modern taste no more no less | D3 |
The Ethics 'tis a treatise I find hard | C |
To read aright now that my hair is gray | M2 |
And I can manage the original | E3 |
At five years old how ill had fared its leaves | D3 |
Now growing double o'er the Stagirite | C |
At least I soil no page with bread and milk | F3 |
Nor crumple dogs ear and deface boys' way | M2 |
Robert Browning
(1)
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