The Dreamer Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABABACACDEDEFF GHHI JKJLMNMNOPQPRSRSTT UJIJ VWVWNXNXPYPYZA2ZA2B2 B2 HJIJ C2WD2WMHMHE2F2E2F2JJ FVFVI EG2EG2NH2NH2I2J2K2J2 AIAIThe lone man gazed and gazed upon his gold | A |
His sweat his blood the wage of weary days | B |
But now how sweet how doubly sweet to hold | A |
All gay and gleamy to the campfire blaze | B |
The evening sky was sinister and cold | A |
The willows shivered wanly lay the snow | C |
The uncommiserating land so old | A |
So worn so grey so niggard in its woe | C |
Peered through its ragged shroud The lone man sighed | D |
Poured back the gaudy dust into its poke | E |
Gazed at the seething river listless eyed | D |
Loaded his corn cob pipe as if to smoke | E |
Then crushed with weariness and hardship crept | F |
Into his ragged robe and swiftly slept | F |
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Hour after hour went by a shadow slipped | G |
From vasts of shadow to the camp fire flame | H |
Gripping a rifle with a deadly aim | H |
A gaunt and hairy man with wolfish eyes | I |
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The sleeper dreamed and lo this was his dream | J |
He rode a streaming horse across a moor | K |
Sudden 'mid pit black night a lightning gleam | J |
Showed him a way side inn forlorn and poor | L |
A sullen host unbarred the creaking door | M |
And led him to a dim and dreary room | N |
Wherein he sat and poked the fire a roar | M |
So that weird shadows jigged athwart the gloom | N |
He ordered wine 'Od's blood but he was tired | O |
What matter Charles was crushed and George was King | P |
His party high in power how he aspired | Q |
Red guineas packed his purse too tight to ring | P |
The fire light gleamed upon his silken hose | R |
His silver buckles and his powdered wig | S |
What ho more wine He drank he slowly rose | R |
What made the shadows dance that madcap jig | S |
He clutched the candle steered his way to bed | T |
And in a trice was sleeping like the dead | T |
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Across the room there crept so shadow soft | U |
His sullen host with naked knife a gleam | J |
A gaunt and hairy man with wolfish eyes | I |
And as he lay the sleeper dreamed a dream | J |
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'Twas in a ruder land a wilder day | V |
A rival princeling sat upon his throne | W |
Within a dungeon dark and foul he lay | V |
With chains that bit and festered to the bone | W |
They haled him harshly to a vaulted room | N |
Where One gazed on him with malignant eye | X |
And in that devil face he read his doom | N |
Knowing that ere the dawn light he must die | X |
Well he was sorrow glutted let them bring | P |
Their prize assassins to the bloody work | Y |
His kingdom lost yet would he die a King | P |
Fearless and proud as when he faced the Turk | Y |
Ah God the glory of that great Crusade | Z |
The bannered pomp the gleam the splendid urge | A2 |
The crash of reeking combat blade to blade | Z |
The reeling ranks blood avid and a surge | A2 |
For long he thought then feeling o'er him creep | B2 |
Vast weariness he fell into a sleep | B2 |
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The cell door opened soft the headsman came | H |
Within his hand a mighty axe a gleam | J |
A gaunt and hairy man with wolfish eyes | I |
And as he lay the sleeper dreamed a dream | J |
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'Twas in a land unkempt of life's red dawn | C2 |
Where in his sanded cave he dwelt alone | W |
Sleeping by day or sometimes worked upon | D2 |
His flint head arrows and his knives of stone | W |
By night stole forth and slew the savage boar | M |
So that he loomed a hunter of loud fame | H |
And many a skin of wolf and wild cat wore | M |
And counted many a flint head to his name | H |
Wherefore he walked the envy of the band | E2 |
Hated and feared but matchless in his skill | F2 |
Till lo one night deep in that shaggy land | E2 |
He tracked a yearling bear and made his kill | F2 |
Then over worn he rested by a stream | J |
And sank into a sleep too deep for dream | J |
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Hunting his food a rival caveman crept | F |
Through those dark woods and marked him where he lay | V |
Cowered and crawled upon him as he slept | F |
Poising a mighty stone aloft to slay | V |
A gaunt and hairy man with wolfish eyes | I |
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The great stone crashed The Dreamer shrieked and woke | E |
And saw fear blinded in his dripping cell | G2 |
A gaunt and hairy man who with one stroke | E |
Swung a great ax of steel that flashed and fell | G2 |
So that he woke amid his bedroom gloom | N |
And saw hair poised a naked thirsting knife | H2 |
A gaunt and hairy man with eyes of doom | N |
And then the blade plunged down to drink his life | H2 |
So that he woke wrenched back his robe and looked | I2 |
And saw beside his dying fire upstart | J2 |
A gaunt and hairy man with finger crooked | K2 |
A rifle rang a bullet searched his heart | J2 |
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The morning sky was sinister and cold | A |
Grotesque the Dreamer sprawled and did not rise | I |
For long and long there gazed upon some gold | A |
A gaunt and hairy man with wolfish eyes | I |
Robert William Service
(1)
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