The Lover In Hell Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGH IJKLMNOPKQKORHHBSATU VHKHKKUWXYZRA2FKHBKK KKKB2QHSC2D2RHHHHE2K RRF2 G2Eternally the choking steam goes up | A |
From the black pools of seething oil | B |
How merry | C |
Those little devils are They've stolen the pitchfork | D |
From Bel there as he slept Look oh look look | E |
They've got at Nero Oh it isn't fair | F |
Lord how he squeals Stop it it's well indecent | G |
But funny See Bel's waked They'll catch it now | H |
- | |
Eternally that stifling reek arises | I |
Blotting the dome with smoky terrible towers | J |
Black strangling trees whispering obscene things | K |
Amongst their branches clutching with maimed hands | L |
Or oozing slowly like blind tentacles | M |
Up to the gates higher than that heaped brick | N |
Man piled to smite the sun And all around | O |
Are devils One can laugh but that hunched shape | P |
The face one stone like those Assyrian kings | K |
One sees in carvings watching men flayed red | Q |
Horribly laughable in leaps and writhes | K |
That face utterly evil clouded round | O |
With evil like a smoke it turns smiles sour | R |
And Nero there the flabby cheeks astrain | H |
And sweating agony long agony | H |
Imperishable unappeasable | B |
For ever well it droops the mouth Till I | S |
Look up | A |
There's one blue patch no smoke dares touch | T |
Sky clear ineffable alive with light | U |
Always the same | V |
Before I never knew | H |
Rest and green peace | K |
She stands there in the sun | H |
It seems so quaint she should have long gold wings | K |
I never have got used folded across | K |
Her breast or fluttering with fierce pure light | U |
Like shaken steel Her crown too Well it's queer | W |
And then she never cared much for the harp | X |
On earth Here though | Y |
She is all peace all quiet | Z |
All passionate desires the eloquent thunder | R |
Of new glad suns shouting aloud for joy | A2 |
Over fresh worlds and clean trampling the air | F |
Like stooping hawks to the long wind of horns | K |
Flung from the bastions of Eternity | H |
And she is the low lake drowsy and gentle | B |
And good words spoken from the tongues of friends | K |
And calmness in the evening and deep thoughts | K |
Falling like dreams from the stars' solemn mouths | K |
All these | K |
They said she was unfaithful once | K |
Or I remembered it and so for that | B2 |
I lie here I suppose Yes so they said | Q |
You see she is so troubled looking down | H |
Sorrowing deeply for my torments I | S |
Of course feel nothing while I see her save | C2 |
That sometimes when I think the matter out | D2 |
And what earth people said of us of her | R |
It seems as if I must be here in heaven | H |
And she | H |
Then I grow proud and suddenly | H |
There comes a splatter of oil against my skin | H |
Hurting this time And I forget my pride | E2 |
And my face writhes | K |
Some day the little ladder | R |
Of white words that I build up up to her | R |
May fetch me out Meanwhile it isn't bad | F2 |
- | |
But what a sense of humor God must have | G2 |
Stephen Vincent Benet
(1)
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