The To-be-forgotten Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABBBB ACDEE AFFFA BBGG BBEE EE HH BBII| I | A |
| I heard a small sad sound | B |
| And stood awhile among the tombs around | B |
| Wherefore old friends said I are you distrest | B |
| Now screened from life's unrest | B |
| - | |
| II | A |
| O not at being here | C |
| But that our future second death is near | D |
| When with the living memory of us numbs | E |
| And blank oblivion comes | E |
| - | |
| III | A |
| These our sped ancestry | F |
| Lie here embraced by deeper death than we | F |
| Nor shape nor thought of theirs can you descry | F |
| With keenest backward eye | A |
| - | |
| IV | - |
| They count as quite forgot | B |
| They are as men who have existed not | B |
| Theirs is a loss past loss of fitful breath | G |
| It is the second death | G |
| - | |
| V | - |
| We here as yet each day | B |
| Are blest with dear recall as yet can say | B |
| We hold in some soul loved continuance | E |
| Of shape and voice and glance | E |
| - | |
| VI | - |
| But what has been will be | - |
| First memory then oblivion's swallowing sea | - |
| Like men foregone shall we merge into those | E |
| Whose story no one knows | E |
| - | |
| VII | - |
| For which of us could hope | H |
| To show in life that world awakening scope | H |
| Granted the few whose memory none lets die | - |
| But all men magnify | - |
| - | |
| VIII | - |
| We were but Fortune's sport | B |
| Things true things lovely things of good report | B |
| We neither shunned nor sought We see our bourne | I |
| And seeing it we mourn | I |
Thomas Hardy
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Clive Reedman: It is this poem that inspired me to become a professional genealogist. It drew on my fascination with and love of churchyards and made me think on the lives of those around me there. The concept of 'second death' rang in my ears and pushed me to think on them and to learn the skills that gave me the power to bring them back and to tell again their stories.
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