Falling Asleep Over The Aeneid Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: A BBCCDDEEFFGGHHIIJJKK KKLLMMNOPPQQRRSTUUVV WWXYZZA2A2B2C2D2E2F2 G2H2I2J2J2K2K2L2L2M2 M2N2O2P2Q2R2R2S2S2T2 T2H2H2U2U2V2V2HHW2W2 X2X2

An old man in Concord forgets to go to morning service He falls asleep while reading Vergil and dreams that he is Aeneas at the funeral of Pallas an Italian princeA
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The sun is blue and scarlet on my pageB
And yuck a yuck a yuck a yuck a rageB
The yellowhammers mating Yellow fireC
Blankets the captives dancing on their pyreC
And the scorched lictor screams and drops his rodD
Trojans are singing to their drunken GodD
Ares Their helmets catch on fire Their filesE
Clank by the body of my comrade milesE
Of filings Now the scythe wheeled chariot rollsF
Before their lances long as vaulting polesF
And I stand up and heil the thousand menG
Who carry Pallas to the bird priest ThenG
The bird priest groans and as his birds foretoldH
I greet the body lip to lip I holdH
The sword that Dido used It tries to speakI
A bird with Dido s sworded breast Its beakI
Clangs and ejaculates the Punic wordJ
I hear the bird priest chirping like a birdJ
I groan a little Who am I and whyK
It asks a boy s face though its arrow eyeK
Is working from its socket Brother tryK
O Child of Aphrodite try to dieK
To die is life His harlots hang his bedL
With feathers of his long tailed birds His headL
Is yawning like a person The plumes blowM
The beard and eyebrows ruffle Face of snowM
You are the flower that country girls have caughtN
A wild bee pillaged honey suckle broughtO
To the returning bridegroom the designP
Has not yet left it and the petals shineP
The earth its mother has at last no helpQ
It is itself The broken winded yelpQ
Of my Phoenician hounds that fills the brushR
With snapping twigs and flying cannot flushR
The ghost of Pallas But I take his pallS
Stiff with its gold and purple and recallT
How Dido hugged it to her while she toiledU
Laughing her golden threads a serpent coiledU
In cypress Now I lay it like a sheetV
It clinks and settles down upon his feetV
The careless yellow hair that seemed to burnW
Beforehand Left foot right foot as they turnW
More pyres are rising armored horses bronzeX
And gagged Italians who must file by onesY
Across the bitter river when my thumbZ
Tightens into their wind pipes The beaks drumZ
Their headman s cow horned death s head bites its tongueA2
And stiffens as it eyes the hero slungA2
Inside his feathered hammock on the crossedB2
Staves of the eagles that we winged Our costC2
Is nothing to the lovers whoring MarsD2
And Venus father s lover Now his car sE2
Plumage is ready and my marshals fetchF2
His squire Acoctes white with age to hitchG2
Aethon the hero s charger and its earsH2
Prick and it steps and steps and stately tearsI2
Lather its teeth and then the harlots bringJ2
The hero s charms and baton but the KingJ2
Vain glorious Turnus carried off the restK2
I was myself but Ares thought it bestK2
The way it happened At the end of timeL2
He sets his spear as my descendants climbL2
The knees of Father Time his beard of scalpsM2
His scythe the arc of steel that crowns the AlpsM2
The elephants of Carthage hold those snowsN2
Turms of Numidian horse unsling their bowsO2
The flaming turkey feathered arrows swarmP2
Beyond the Alps Pallas I raise my armQ2
And shout Brother eternal health FarewellR2
Forever Church is over and its bellR2
Frightens the yellowhammers as I wakeS2
And watch the whitecaps wrinkle up the lakeS2
Mother s great aunt who died when I was eightT2
Stands by our parlor sabre Boy it s lateT2
Vergil must keep the Sabbath Eighty yearsH2
It all comes back My Uncle Charles appearsH2
Blue capped and bird like Phillips Brooks and GrantU2
Are frowning at his coffin and my auntU2
Hearing his colored volunteers paradeV2
Through Concord laughs and tells her English maidV2
To clip his yellow nostril hairs and foldH
His colors on him It is I I holdH
His sword to keep from falling for the dustW2
On the stuffed birds is breathless for the bustW2
Of young Augustus weighs on Vergil s shelfX2
It scowls into my glasses at itselfX2

Robert Lowell



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