Cruisers Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BBCC DDEE FFGG HHII JJKK LLII MNOO KKPP QRSS TUNO VVGG OOOO| A | |
| - | |
| - | |
| As our mother the Frigate bepainted and fine | B |
| Made play for her bully the Ship of the Line | B |
| So we her bold daughters by iron and fire | C |
| Accost and decoy to our masters' desire | C |
| - | |
| Now pray you consider what toils we endure | D |
| Night walking wet sea lanes a guard and a lure | D |
| Since half of our trade is that same pretty sort | E |
| As mettlesome wenches do practise in port | E |
| - | |
| For this is our office to spy and make room | F |
| As hiding yet guiding the foe to their doom | F |
| Surrounding confounding we bait and betray | G |
| And tempt them to battle the seas' width away | G |
| - | |
| The pot bellied merchant foreboding no wrong | H |
| With headlight and sidelight he lieth along | H |
| Till lightless and lightfoot and lurking leap we | I |
| To force him discover his business by sea | I |
| - | |
| And when we have wakened the lust of a foe | J |
| To draw him by flight toward our bullies we go | J |
| Till 'ware of strange smoke stealing nearer he flies | K |
| Or our bullies close in for to make him good prize | K |
| - | |
| So when we have spied on the path of their host | L |
| One flieth to carry that word to the coast | L |
| And lest by false doublings they turn and go free | I |
| One lieth behind them to follow and see | I |
| - | |
| Anon we return being gathered again | M |
| Across the sad valleys all drabbled with rain | N |
| Across the grey ridges all crisped and curled | O |
| To join the long dance round the curve of the world | O |
| - | |
| The bitter salt spindrift the sun glare likewise | K |
| The moon track a tremble bewilders our eyes | K |
| Where linking and lifting our sisters we hail | P |
| 'Twixt wrench of cross surges or plunge of head gale | P |
| - | |
| As maidens awaiting the bride to come forth | Q |
| Make play with light jestings and wit of no worth | R |
| So widdershins circling the bride bed of death | S |
| Each fleereth her neighbour and signeth and saith | S |
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| quot What see ye Their signals or levin afar | T |
| quot What hear ye God's thunder or guns of our war | U |
| quot What mark ye Their smoke or the cloud rack outblown | N |
| quot What chase ye Their lights or the Daystar low down quot | O |
| - | |
| So times past all number deceived by false shows | V |
| Deceiving we cumber the road of our foes | V |
| For this is our virtue to track and betray | G |
| Preparing great battles a sea's width away | G |
| - | |
| Now peace is at end and our peoples take heart | O |
| For the laws are clean gone that restrained our art | O |
| Up and down the near headlands and against the far wind | O |
| We are loosed O be swift to the work of our kind | O |
Rudyard Kipling
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