The Slave Dealer Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABABAB CDEDFD GHGHGH IJIKIK KLJLML NHNHO BPBPBP QLQLQLFrom ocean's wave a Wanderer came | A |
With visage tanned and dun | B |
His Mother when he told his name | A |
Scarce knew her long lost son | B |
So altered was his face and frame | A |
By the ill course he had run | B |
- | |
There was hot fever in his blood | C |
And dark thoughts in his brain | D |
And oh to turn his heart to good | E |
That Mother strove in vain | D |
For fierce and fearful was his mood | F |
Racked by remorse and pain | D |
- | |
And if at times a gleam more mild | G |
Would o'er his features stray | H |
When knelt the Widow near her Child | G |
And he tried with her to pray | H |
It lasted not for visions wild | G |
Still scared good thoughts away | H |
- | |
There's blood upon my hands he said | I |
Which water cannot wash | J |
It was not shed where warriors bled | I |
It dropped from the gory lash | K |
As I whirled it o'er and o'er my head | I |
And with each stroke left a gash | K |
- | |
With every stroke I left a gash | K |
While Negro blood sprang high | L |
And now all ocean cannot wash | J |
My soul from murder's dye | L |
Nor e'en thy prayer dear Mother quash | M |
That Woman's wild death cry | L |
- | |
Her cry is ever in my ear | N |
And it will not let me pray | H |
Her look I see her voice I hear | N |
As when in death she lay | H |
And said 'With me thou must appear | O |
On God's great Judgment day ' | - |
- | |
Now Christ from frenzy keep my son | B |
The woeful Widow cried | P |
Such murder foul thou ne'er hast done | B |
Some fiend thy soul belied | P |
Nay Mother the Avenging One | B |
Was witness when she died | P |
- | |
The writhing wretch with furious heel | Q |
I crushed no mortal nigh | L |
But that same hour her dread appeal | Q |
Was registered on high | L |
And now with God I have to deal | Q |
And dare not meet His eye | L |
Thomas Pringle
(1)
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