God's Funeral Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCBC ADEDE AFGFG FHFH IJIJ K K LMMM NMNM FOMOM FPQRQ MMSMS MMMM MMMM MMMM MMMM MMMM TMTM| I | A |
| I saw a slowly stepping train | B |
| Lined on the brows scoop eyed and bent and hoar | C |
| Following in files across a twilit plain | B |
| A strange and mystic form the foremost bore | C |
| - | |
| II | A |
| And by contagious throbs of thought | D |
| Or latent knowledge that within me lay | E |
| And had already stirred me I was wrought | D |
| To consciousness of sorrow even as they | E |
| - | |
| III | A |
| The fore borne shape to my blurred eyes | F |
| At first seemed man like and anon to change | G |
| To an amorphous cloud of marvellous size | F |
| At times endowed with wings of glorious range | G |
| - | |
| IV | - |
| And this phantasmal variousness | F |
| Ever possessed it as they drew along | H |
| Yet throughout all it symboled none the less | F |
| Potency vast and loving kindness strong | H |
| - | |
| V | - |
| Almost before I knew I bent | I |
| Towards the moving columns without a word | J |
| They growing in bulk and numbers as they went | I |
| Struck out sick thoughts that could be overheard | J |
| - | |
| VI | - |
| 'O man projected Figure of late | K |
| Imaged as we thy knell who shall survive | - |
| Whence came it we were tempted to create | K |
| One whom we can no longer keep alive | - |
| - | |
| VII | - |
| 'Framing him jealous fierce at first | L |
| We gave him justice as the ages rolled | M |
| Will to bless those by circumstance accurst | M |
| And longsuffering and mercies manifold | M |
| - | |
| VIII | - |
| 'And tricked by our own early dream | N |
| And need of solace we grew self deceived | M |
| Our making soon our maker did we deem | N |
| And what we had imagined we believed | M |
| - | |
| IX | F |
| 'Till in Time's stayless stealthy swing | O |
| Uncompromising rude reality | M |
| Mangled the Monarch of our fashioning | O |
| Who quavered sank and now has ceased to be | M |
| - | |
| X | F |
| 'So toward our myth's oblivion | P |
| Darkling and languid lipped we creep and grope | Q |
| Sadlier than those who wept in Babylon | R |
| Whose Zion was a still abiding hope | Q |
| - | |
| XI | M |
| 'How sweet it was in years far hied | M |
| To start the wheels of day with trustful prayer | S |
| To lie down liegely at the eventide | M |
| And feel a blest assurance he was there | S |
| - | |
| XII | M |
| 'And who or what shall fill his place | M |
| Whither will wanderers turn distracted eyes | M |
| For some fixed star to stimulate their pace | M |
| Towards the goal of their enterprise ' | - |
| - | |
| XIII | M |
| Some in the background then I saw | M |
| Sweet women youths men all incredulous | M |
| Who chimed as one 'This is figure is of straw | M |
| This requiem mockery Still he lives to us ' | - |
| - | |
| XIV | - |
| I could not prop their faith and yet | M |
| Many I had known with all I sympathized | M |
| And though struck speechless I did not forget | M |
| That what was mourned for I too once had prized | M |
| - | |
| XV | - |
| Still how to bear such loss I deemed | M |
| The insistent question for each animate mind | M |
| And gazing to my growing sight there seemed | M |
| A pale yet positive gleam low down behind | M |
| - | |
| XVI | - |
| Whereof to lift the general night | M |
| A certain few who stood aloof had said | M |
| 'See you upon the horizon that small light | M |
| Swelling somewhat ' Each mourner shook his head | M |
| - | |
| XVII | - |
| And they composed a crowd of whom | T |
| Some were right good and many nigh the best | M |
| Thus dazed and puzzled 'twixt the gleam and gloom | T |
| Mechanically I followed with the rest | M |
Thomas Hardy
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