Imperante Augusto Natus Est-- Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCD EFGHIJKLMKNKOPQKKRSK TUKRUKKUUKKJVKJWXKYZ A2B2UUC2UXKA2TSD2UE2 F2UUUKUTG2KH2KI2UUKK KI2UKKKKKJ2K2JUUD2KK XL2KUM2KKN2KO2P2UK2U KUUKUD2Q2R2U KKKS2O2UT2U2G2OKUV2W 2UX2UKUI2N2KY2N2Z2KT UA3KB3SUUKJC3D3 E3KUC3KKZ2F3N2KG3H3What it was struck the terror into me | A |
This Publius closer while we wait our turn | B |
I'll tell you Water's warm they ring inside | C |
At the eighth hour till when no use to bathe | D |
- | |
Here in the vestibule where now we sit | E |
One scarce stood yesterday the throng was such | F |
Of loyal gapers folk all eye and ear | G |
While Lucius Varius Rufus in their midst | H |
Read out that long planned late completed piece | I |
His Panegyric on the Emperor | J |
Nobody like him little Flaccus laughed | K |
At leading forth an Epos with due pomp | L |
Only when godlike C sar swells the theme | M |
How should mere mortals hope to praise aright | K |
Tell me thou offshoot of Etruscan kings | N |
Whereat M cenas smiling sighed assent | K |
I paid my quadrans left the Therm roar | O |
Of rapture as the poet asked What place | P |
Among the godships Jove for C sar's sake | Q |
Would bid its actual occupant vacate | K |
In favor of the new divinity | K |
And got the expected answer Yield thine own | R |
Jove thus dethroned I somehow wanted air | S |
And found myself a pacing street and street | K |
Letting the sunset rosy over Rome | T |
Clear my head dizzy with the hubbub say | U |
As if thought's dance therein had kicked up dust | K |
By trampling on all else the world lay prone | R |
As poet propped in brave hexameters | U |
Their subject triumphed up from man to God | K |
Caius Octavius C sar the August | K |
Where was escape from his prepotency | U |
I judge I may have passed how many piles | U |
Of structure dropt like doles from his free hand | K |
To Rome on every side Why right and left | K |
For temples you've the Thundering Jupiter | J |
Avenging Mars Apollo Palatine | V |
How count Piazza Forum there's a third | K |
All but completed You've the Theatre | J |
Named of Marcellus all his work such work | W |
One thought still ending dominating all | X |
With warrant Varius sang Be C sar God | K |
By what a hold arrests he Fortune's wheel | Y |
Obtaining and retaining heaven and earth | Z |
Through Fortune if you like but favor no | A2 |
For the great deeds flashed by me fast and thick | B2 |
As stars which storm the sky on autumn nights | U |
Those conquests but peace crowned them so of peace | U |
Count up his titles only these in few | C2 |
Ten years Triumvir Consul thirteen times | U |
Emperor nay the glory topping all | X |
Hailed Father of his Country last and best | K |
Of titles by himself accepted so | A2 |
And why not See but feats achieved in Rome | T |
Not to say Italy he planted there | S |
Some thirty colonies but Rome itself | D2 |
All new built marble now brick once he boasts | U |
This Portico that Circus Would you sail | E2 |
He has drained Tiber for you would you walk | F2 |
He straightened out the long Flaminian Way | U |
Poor Profit by his score of donatives | U |
Rich that is mirthful Half a hundred games | U |
Challenge your choice There's Rome for you and me | K |
Only The centre of the world besides | U |
For look the wide world over where ends Rome | T |
To sunrise There's Euphrates all between | G2 |
To sunset Ocean and immensity | K |
North stare till Danube stops you South see Nile | H2 |
The Desert and the earth upholding Mount | K |
Well may the poet people each with each | I2 |
Vie in his praise our company of swans | U |
Virgil and Horace singers in their way | U |
Nearly as good as Varius though less famed | K |
Well may they cry No mortal plainly God | K |
- | |
Thus to myself myself said while I walked | K |
Or would have said could thought attain to speech | I2 |
Clean baffled by enormity of bliss | U |
The while I strove to scale its heights and sound | K |
Its depths this Amsterdam o'er all the world | K |
Of one who was but born like you like me | K |
Like all the world he owns of flesh and blood | K |
But he how grasp how gauge his own conceit | K |
Of bliss to me near inconceivable | J2 |
Or since such flight too much makes reel the brain | K2 |
Let's sink and so take refuge as it were | J |
From life's excessive altitude to lift's | U |
Breathable wayside shelter at its base | U |
If blooms thus large this C sar to myself | D2 |
Of senatorial rank and somebody | K |
How must he strike the vulgar nameless crowd | K |
In numerous swarm that's nobody at all | X |
Why for an instance much as yon gold shape | L2 |
Crowned sceptred on the temple opposite | K |
Fulgurant Jupiter must daze the sense | U |
Of say yon outcast begging from its step | M2 |
What Anti C sar monarch in the mud | K |
As he is pinnacled above thy pate | K |
Ay beg away thy lot contrasts full well | N2 |
With his whose bounty yields thee this support | K |
Our Holy and Inviolable One | O2 |
C sar whose bounty built the fane above | P2 |
Dost read my thought Thy garb alack displays | U |
Sore usage truly in each rent and stain | K2 |
Faugh Wash though in Suburra 'Ware the dogs | U |
Who may not so disdain a meal on thee | K |
What stretchest forth a palm to catch my alms | U |
Aha why yes I must appear who knows | U |
I in my toga to thy rags and thee | K |
Qu stor nay dile Censor Pol perhaps | U |
The very City Pr tor's noble self | D2 |
As to me C sar so to thee am I | Q2 |
Good nor in vain shall prove thy quest poor rogue | R2 |
Hither hold palm out take this quarter as | U |
- | |
And who did take it As he raised his head | K |
My gesture was a trifle well abrupt | K |
Back fell the broad flap of the peasant's hat | K |
The homespun cloak that muffled half his check | S2 |
Dropped somewhat and I had a glimpse just one | O2 |
One was enough Whose whose might be the face | U |
That unkempt careless hair brown yellowish | T2 |
Those sparkling eyes beneath their eyebrows' ridge | U2 |
Each meets each and the hawk nose rules between | G2 |
That was enough no glimpse was needed more | O |
And terrifyingly into my mind | K |
Came that quick hushed report was whispered us | U |
They do say once a year in sordid garb | V2 |
He plays the mendicant sits all day long | W2 |
Asking and taking alms of who may pass | U |
And so averting if submission help | X2 |
Fate's envy the dread chance and change of things | U |
When Fortune for a word a look a naught | K |
Turns spiteful and the petted lioness | U |
Strikes with her sudden paw and prone falls each | I2 |
Who patted late her neck superiorly | N2 |
Or trifled with those claw tips velvet sheathed | K |
He's God shouts Lucius Varius Rufus Man | Y2 |
And worms' meat any moment mutters low | N2 |
Some Power admonishing the mortal born | Z2 |
Ay do you mind There's meaning in the fact | K |
That whoso conquers triumphs enters Rome | T |
Climbing the Capitolian soaring thus | U |
To glory's summit Publius do you mark | A3 |
Ever the same attendant who behind | K |
Above the Conqueror's head supports the crown | B3 |
All too demonstrative for human wear | S |
One hand's employment all the while reserves | U |
Its fellow backward flung to point how close | U |
Appended from the car beneath the foot | K |
Of the up borne exulting Conqueror | J |
Frown half descried the instruments of shame | C3 |
The malefactor's due Crown now Cross when | D3 |
- | |
Who stands secure Are even Gods so safe | E3 |
Jupiter that just now is dominant | K |
Are not there ancient dismal tales how once | U |
A predecessor reigned ere Saturn came | C3 |
And who can say if Jupiter be last | K |
Was it for nothing the gray Sibyl wrote | K |
C sar Augustus regnant shall be born | Z2 |
In blind Jud a one to master him | F3 |
Him and the universe An old wife's tale | N2 |
Bath drudge Here slave No cheating Our turn next | K |
No loitering or be sure you taste the lash | G3 |
Two strigils two oil drippers each a sponge | H3 |
Robert Browning
(1)
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