James Lee's Wife Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BCBCDCD EFEFGFG HIJIKIK L MNMAAOON PQPRRSSQ TUTVVWWU IFXFHHYYX B ZA2ZB2C2C2Z C2D2C2D2E2E2C2 IF2IF2C2C2I IG2C2G2C2C2C2G2 H2 FI2FFI2 EJ2EEJ2 K2E2K2K2E2 IC2FC2C2F INL2NNL2 IM2IM2M2I IF2I2F2F2I2 IIC2IIC2 I IIN2IN2O2O2 IC2P2C2P2J2J2 IBFBFC2C2 IQ2R2Q2IC2C2 IAS2AS2XX I IAIAIA IC2R2C2R2C2 IT2R2T2R2T2 IO2FO2FJ IC2C2C2C2C2 IC2C2C2C2C2 IC2E2C2E2C2 IEU2EU2E EC2IC2IC2 EC2C2C2C2C2 IV2EV2EV2 EEEEEE ER2M2R2M2R2 IC2C2C2V2C2 IC2EC2EC2 IIW2IW2I E C2K2EC2K2EC2 C2FEIFEI C2 C2C2W2C2W2C2C2EER2C2 C2R2NNFS2FX2X2FFEC2C 2EE C2W2EW2EC2C2C2C2NNII FS2FX2C2R2C2R2R2C2 C2C2C2C2C2C2FFC2FY2Y 2C2Y2C2C2 C2C2C2EYYEEE2C2C2E2E EV2V2C2V2 V2JZ2V2 C2C2 A3 C2IEIEI C2IM2IM2I C2IO2IO2I IIX2IX2I IIB3IB3I IIIIII IIEIEI IIR2IR2II James Lee's Wife Speaks at the Window | A |
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I | - |
Ah Love but a day | B |
And the world has changed | C |
The sun's away | B |
And the bird estranged | C |
The wind has dropped | D |
And the sky's deranged | C |
Summer has stopped | D |
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II | - |
Look in my eyes | E |
Wilt thou change too | F |
Should I fear surprise | E |
Shall I find aught new | F |
In the old and dear | G |
In the good and true | F |
With the changing year | G |
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III | - |
Thou art a man | H |
But I am thy love | I |
For the lake its swan | J |
For the dell its dove | I |
And for thee oh haste | K |
Me to bend above | I |
Me to hold embraced | K |
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II By the Fireside | L |
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I | - |
Is all our fire of shipwreck wood | M |
Oak and pine | N |
Oh for the ills half understood | M |
The dim dead woe | A |
Long ago | A |
Befallen this bitter coast of France | O |
Well poor sailors took their chance | O |
I take mine | N |
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II | - |
A ruddy shaft our fire must shoot | P |
O'er the sea | Q |
Do sailors eye the casement mute | P |
Drenched and stark | R |
From their bark | R |
And envy gnash their teeth for hate | S |
O' the warm safe house and happy freight | S |
Thee and me | Q |
- | |
III | - |
God help you sailors at your need | T |
Spare the curse | U |
For some ships safe in port indeed | T |
Rot and rust | V |
Run to dust | V |
All through worms i' the wood which crept | W |
Gnawed our hearts out while we slept | W |
That is worse | U |
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IV | I |
Who lived here before us two | F |
Old world pairs | X |
Did a woman ever would I knew | F |
Watch the man | H |
With whom began | H |
Love's voyage full sail now gnash your teeth | Y |
When planks start open hell beneath | Y |
Unawares | X |
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III In the Doorway | B |
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I | - |
The swallow has set her six young on the rail | Z |
And looks sea ward | A2 |
The water's in stripes like a snake olive pale | Z |
To the leeward | B2 |
On the weather side black spotted white with the wind | C2 |
Good fortune departs and disaster's behind | C2 |
Hark the wind with its wants and its infinite wail | Z |
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II | - |
Our fig tree that leaned for the saltness has furled | C2 |
Her five fingers | D2 |
Each leaf like a hand opened wide to the world | C2 |
Where there lingers | D2 |
No glint of the gold Summer sent for her sake | E2 |
How the vines writhe in rows each impaled on its stake | E2 |
My heart shrivels up and my spirit shrinks curled | C2 |
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III | - |
Yet here are we two we have love house enough | I |
With the field there | F2 |
This house of four rooms that field red and rough | I |
Though it yield there | F2 |
For the rabbit that robs scarce a blade or a bent | C2 |
If a magpie alight now it seems an event | C2 |
And they both will be gone at November's rebuff | I |
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IV | I |
But why must cold spread but wherefore bring change | G2 |
To the spirit | C2 |
God meant should mate his with an infinite range | G2 |
And inherit | C2 |
His power to put life in the darkness and cold | C2 |
Oh live and love worthily bear and be bold | C2 |
Whom Summer made friends of let Winter estrange | G2 |
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IV Along the Beach | H2 |
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I | - |
I will be quiet and talk with you | F |
And reason why you are wrong | I2 |
You wanted my love is that much true | F |
And so I did love so I do | F |
What has come of it all along | I2 |
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II | - |
I took you how could I otherwise | E |
For a world to me and more | J2 |
For all love greatens and glorifies | E |
Till God's a glow to the loving eyes | E |
In what was mere earth before | J2 |
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III | - |
Yes earth yes mere ignoble earth | K2 |
Now do I mis state mistake | E2 |
Do I wrong your weakness and call it worth | K2 |
Expect all harvest dread no dearth | K2 |
Seal my sense up for your sake | E2 |
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IV | I |
Oh Love Love no Love I not so indeed | C2 |
You were just weak earth I knew | F |
With much in you waste with many a weed | C2 |
And plenty of passions run to seed | C2 |
But a little good grain too | F |
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V | I |
And such as you were I took you for mine | N |
Did not you find me yours | L2 |
To watch the olive and wait the vine | N |
And wonder when rivers of oil and wine | N |
Would flow as the Book assures | L2 |
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VI | I |
Well and if none of these good things came | M2 |
What did the failure prove | I |
The man was my whole world all the same | M2 |
With his flowers to praise or his weeds to blame | M2 |
And either or both to love | I |
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VII | I |
Yet this turns now to a fault there there | F2 |
That I do love watch too long | I2 |
And wait too well and weary and wear | F2 |
And 't is all an old story and my despair | F2 |
Fit subject for some new song | I2 |
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VIII | I |
How the light light love he has wings to fly | I |
At suspicion of a bond | C2 |
My wisdom has bidden your pleasure good bye | I |
Which will turn up next in a laughing eye | I |
And why should you look beyond | C2 |
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V On the Cliff | I |
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I | I |
I leaned on the turf | I |
I looked at a rock | N2 |
Left dry by the surf | I |
For the turf to call it grass were to mock | N2 |
Dead to the roots so deep was done | O2 |
The work of the summer sun | O2 |
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II | I |
And the rock lay flat | C2 |
As an anvil's face | P2 |
No iron like that | C2 |
Baked dry of a weed of a shell no trace | P2 |
Sunshine outside but ice at the core | J2 |
Death's altar by the lone shore | J2 |
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III | I |
On the turf sprang gay | B |
With his films of blue | F |
No cricket I'll say | B |
But a warhorse barded and chanfroned too | F |
The gift of a quixote mage to his knight | C2 |
Real fairy with wings all right | C2 |
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IV | I |
On the rock they scorch | Q2 |
Like a drop of fire | R2 |
From a brandished torch | Q2 |
Fall two red fans of a butterfly | I |
No turf no rock in their ugly stead | C2 |
See wonderful blue and red | C2 |
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V | I |
Is it not so | A |
With the minds of men | S2 |
The level and low | A |
The burnt and bare in themselves but then | S2 |
With such a blue and red grace not theirs | X |
Love settling unawares | X |
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VI Reading a Book Under the Cliff | I |
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I | I |
Still ailing Wind Wilt be appeased or no | A |
Which needs the other's office thou or I | I |
Dost want to be disburthened of a woe | A |
And can in truth my voice untie | I |
Its links and let it go | A |
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II | I |
Art thou a dumb wronged thing that would be righted | C2 |
Entrusting thus thy cause to me Forbear | R2 |
No tongue can mend such pleadings faith requited | C2 |
With falsehood love at last aware | R2 |
Of scorn hopes early blighted | C2 |
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III | I |
We have them but I know not any tone | T2 |
So fit as thine to falter forth a sorrow | R2 |
Dost think men would go mad without a moan | T2 |
If they knew any way to borrow | R2 |
A pathos like thy own | T2 |
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IV | I |
Which sigh wouldst mock of all the sighs The one | O2 |
So long escaping from lips starved and blue | F |
That lasts while on her pallet bed the nun | O2 |
Stretches her length her foot comes through | F |
The straw she shivers on | J |
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V | I |
You had not thought she was so tall and spent | C2 |
Her shrunk lids open her lean fingers shut | C2 |
Close close their sharp and livid nails indent | C2 |
The clammy palm then all is mute | C2 |
That way the spirit went | C2 |
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VI | I |
Or wouldst thou rather that I understand | C2 |
Thy will to help me like the dog I found | C2 |
Once pacing sad this solitary strand | C2 |
Who would not take my food poor hound | C2 |
But whined and licked my hand | C2 |
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VII | I |
All this and more comes from some young man's pride | C2 |
Of power to see in failure and mistake | E2 |
Relinquishment disgrace on every side | C2 |
Merely examples for his sake | E2 |
Helps to his path untried | C2 |
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VIII | I |
Instances he must simply recognize | E |
Oh more than so must with a learner's zeal | U2 |
Make doubly prominent twice emphasize | E |
By added touches that reveal | U2 |
The god in babe's disguise | E |
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IX | E |
Oh he knows what defeat means and the rest | C2 |
Himself the undefeated that shall be | I |
Failure disgrace he flings them you to test | C2 |
His triumph in eternity | I |
Too plainly manifest | C2 |
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X | E |
Whence judge if he learn forthwith what the wind | C2 |
Means in its moaning by the happy prompt | C2 |
Instinctive way of youth I mean for kind | C2 |
Calm years exacting their accompt | C2 |
Of pain mature the mind | C2 |
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XI | I |
And some midsummer morning at the lull | V2 |
Just about daybreak as he looks across | E |
A sparkling foreign country wonderful | V2 |
To the sea's edge for gloom and gloss | E |
Next minute must annul | V2 |
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XII | E |
Then when the wind begins among the vines | E |
So low so low what shall it say but this | E |
Here is the change beginning here the lines | E |
Circumscribe beauty set to bliss | E |
The limit time assigns | E |
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XIII | E |
Nothing can be as it has been before | R2 |
Better so call it only not the same | M2 |
To draw one beauty into our hearts' core | R2 |
And keep it changeless such our claim | M2 |
So answered Never more | R2 |
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XIV | I |
Simple Why this is the old woe o' the world | C2 |
Tune to whose rise and fall we live and die | C2 |
Rise with it then Rejoice that man is hurled | C2 |
From change to change unceasingly | V2 |
His soul's wings never furled | C2 |
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XV | I |
That's a new question still replies the fact | C2 |
Nothing endures the wind moans saying so | E |
We moan in acquiescence there's life's pact | C2 |
Perhaps probation do I know | E |
God does endure his act | C2 |
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XVI | I |
Only for man how bitter not to grave | I |
On his soul's hands' palms one fair good wise thing | W2 |
Just as he grasped it For himself death's wave | I |
While time first washes ah the sting | W2 |
O'er all he'd sink to save | I |
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VII Among the Rocks | E |
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I | C2 |
Oh good gigantic smile o' the brown old earth | K2 |
This autumn morning How he sets his bones | E |
To bask i' the sun and thrusts out knees and feet | C2 |
For the ripple to run over in its mirth | K2 |
Listening the while where on the heap of stones | E |
The white breast of the sea lark twitters sweet | C2 |
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II | C2 |
That is the doctrine simple ancient true | F |
Such is life's trial as old earth smiles and knows | E |
If you loved only what were worth your love | I |
Love were clear gain and wholly well for you | F |
Make the low nature better by your throes | E |
Give earth yourself go up for gain above | I |
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VIII Beside the Drawing Board | C2 |
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I | C2 |
As like as a Hand to another Hand | C2 |
Whoever said that foolish thing | W2 |
Could not have studied to understand | C2 |
The counsels of God in fashioning | W2 |
Out of the infinite love of his heart | C2 |
This Hand whose beauty I praise apart | C2 |
From the world of wonder left to praise | E |
If I tried to learn the other ways | E |
Of love in its skill or love in its power | R2 |
As like as a Hand to another Hand | C2 |
Who said that never took his stand | C2 |
Found and followed like me an hour | R2 |
The beauty in this how free how fine | N |
To fear almost of the limit line | N |
As I looked at this and learned and drew | F |
Drew and learned and looked again | S2 |
While fast the happy minutes flew | F |
Its beauty mounted into my brain | X2 |
And a fancy seized me I was fain | X2 |
To efface my work begin anew | F |
Kiss what before I only drew | F |
Ay laying the red chalk 'twixt my lips | E |
With soul to help if the mere lips failed | C2 |
I kissed all right where the drawing ailed | C2 |
Kissed fast the grace that somehow slips | E |
Still from one's soulless finger tips | E |
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II | C2 |
'T is a clay cast the perfect thing | W2 |
From Hand live once dead long ago | E |
Princess like it wears the ring | W2 |
To fancy's eye by which we know | E |
That here at length a master found | C2 |
His match a proud lone soul its mate | C2 |
As soaring genius sank to ground | C2 |
And pencil could not emulate | C2 |
The beauty in this how free how fine | N |
To fear almost of the limit line | N |
Long ago the god like me | I |
The worm learned each in our degree | I |
Looked and loved learned and drew | F |
Drew and learned and loved again | S2 |
While fast the happy minutes flew | F |
Till beauty mounted into his brain | X2 |
And on the finger which outvied | C2 |
His art he placed the ring that's there | R2 |
Still by fancy's eye descried | C2 |
In token of a marriage rare | R2 |
For him on earth his art's despair | R2 |
For him in heaven his soul's fit bride | C2 |
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III | C2 |
Little girl with the poor coarse hand | C2 |
I turned from to a cold clay cast | C2 |
I have my lesson understand | C2 |
The worth of flesh and blood at last | C2 |
Nothing but beauty in a Hand | C2 |
Because he could not change the hue | F |
Mend the lines and make them true | F |
To this which met his soul's demand | C2 |
Would Da Vinci turn from you | F |
I hear him laugh my woes to scorn | Y2 |
The fool forsooth is all forlorn | Y2 |
Because the beauty she thinks best | C2 |
Lived long ago or was never born | Y2 |
Because no beauty bears the test | C2 |
In this rough peasant Hand Confessed | C2 |
'Art is null and study void ' | - |
So sayest thou So said not I | C2 |
Who threw the faulty pencil by | C2 |
And years instead of hours employed | C2 |
Learning the veritable use | E |
Of flesh and bone and nerve beneath | Y |
Lines and hue of the outer sheath | Y |
If haply I might reproduce | E |
One motive of the powers profuse | E |
Flesh and bone and nerve that make | E2 |
The poorest coarsest human hand | C2 |
An object worthy to be scanned | C2 |
A whole life long for their sole sake | E2 |
Shall earth and the cramped moment space | E |
Yield the heavenly crowning grace | E |
Now the parts and then the whole | V2 |
Who art thou with stinted soul | V2 |
And stunted body thus to cry | C2 |
'I love shall that be life's strait dole | V2 |
'I must live beloved or die ' | - |
This peasant hand that spins the wool | V2 |
And bakes the bread why lives it on | J |
Poor and coarse with beauty gone | Z2 |
What use survives the beauty Fool | V2 |
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Go little girl with the poor coarse hand | C2 |
I have my lesson shall understand | C2 |
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IX On Deck | A3 |
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I | C2 |
There is nothing to remember in me | I |
Nothing I ever said with a grace | E |
Nothing I did that you care to see | I |
Nothing I was that deserves a place | E |
In your mind now I leave you set you free | I |
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II | C2 |
Conceded In turn concede to me | I |
Such things have been as a mutual flame | M2 |
Your soul's locked fast but love for a key | I |
You might let it loose till I grew the same | M2 |
In your eyes as in mine you stand strange plea | I |
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III | C2 |
For then then what would it matter to me | I |
That I was the harsh ill favoured one | O2 |
We both should be like as pea and pea | I |
It was ever so since the world begun | O2 |
So let me proceed with my reverie | I |
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IV | I |
How strange it were if you had all me | I |
As I have all you in my heart and brain | X2 |
You whose least word brought gloom or glee | I |
Who never lifted the hand in vain | X2 |
Will hold mine yet from over the sea | I |
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V | I |
Strange if a face when you thought of me | I |
Rose like your own face present now | B3 |
With eyes as dear in their due degree | I |
Much such a mouth and as bright a brow | B3 |
Till you saw yourself while you cried 'T is She | I |
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VI | I |
Well you may you must set down to me | I |
Love that was life life that was love | I |
A tenure of breath at your lips' decree | I |
A passion to stand as your thoughts approve | I |
A rapture to fall where your foot might be | I |
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VII | I |
But did one touch of such love for me | I |
Come in a word or a look of yours | E |
Whose words and looks will circling flee | I |
Round me and round while life endures | E |
Could I fancy As I feel thus feels he | I |
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VIII | I |
Why fade you might to a thing like me | I |
And your hair grow these coarse hanks of hair | R2 |
Your skin this bark of a gnarled tree | I |
You might turn myself should I know or care | R2 |
When I should be dead of joy James Lee | I |
Robert Browning
(1)
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