Song Of The Redwood-tree Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDE FGH IJKLAMNEC OOPQR SDTUV KWVFXDYZKA2B2H GC2D2E2F2 AC2G2G2H2KI2 QJ2K2L2 G2G2M2BM2G2N2PM2 G2O2P2M2Q2R2S2M2G2VM 2KG2G2G2G2VN2P G2PVN2T2U2V2C2M2W2 M2X2G2X2Y2G2CCCP2CX2 Z2M2 X2G2A3FG2B3KCC3FBX2M 2G2B3G2KM2 N2M2G2M2G2 VG2D3D3B M2E3X2M2VA CALIFORNIA song | A |
A prophecy and indirection a thought impalpable to breathe as air | B |
A chorus of dryads fading departing or hamadryads departing | C |
A murmuring fateful giant voice out of the earth and sky | D |
Voice of a mighty dying tree in the Redwood forest dense | E |
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Farewell my brethren | F |
Farewell O earth and sky farewell ye neighboring waters | G |
My time has ended my term has come | H |
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Along the northern coast | I |
Just back from the rock bound shore and the caves | J |
In the saline air from the sea in the Mendocino country | K |
With the surge for bass and accompaniment low and hoarse | L |
With crackling blows of axes sounding musically driven by strong | A |
arms | M |
Riven deep by the sharp tongues of the axes there in the Redwood | N |
forest dense | E |
I heard the mighty tree its death chant chanting | C |
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The choppers heard not the camp shanties echoed not | O |
The quick ear'd teamsters and chain and jack screw men heard not | O |
As the wood spirits came from their haunts of a thousand years to | P |
join the refrain | Q |
But in my soul I plainly heard | R |
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Murmuring out of its myriad leaves | S |
Down from its lofty top rising two hundred feet high | D |
Out of its stalwart trunk and limbs out of its foot thick bark | T |
That chant of the seasons and time chant not of the past only but | U |
the future | V |
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You untold life of me | K |
And all you venerable and innocent joys | W |
Perennial hardy life of me with joys 'mid rain and many a summer | V |
sun | F |
And the white snows and night and the wild winds | X |
O the great patient rugged joys my soul's strong joys unreck'd by | D |
man | Y |
For know I bear the soul befitting me I too have consciousness | Z |
identity | K |
And all the rocks and mountains have and all the earth | A2 |
Joys of the life befitting me and brothers mine | B2 |
Our time our term has come | H |
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Nor yield we mournfully majestic brothers | G |
We who have grandly fill'd our time | C2 |
With Nature's calm content and tacit huge delight | D2 |
We welcome what we wrought for through the past | E2 |
And leave the field for them | F2 |
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For them predicted long | A |
For a superber Race they too to grandly fill their time | C2 |
For them we abdicate in them ourselves ye forest kings | G2 |
In them these skies and airs these mountain peaks Shasta Nevadas | G2 |
These huge precipitous cliffs this amplitude these valleys grand | H2 |
Yosemite | K |
To be in them absorb'd assimilated | I2 |
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Then to a loftier strain | Q |
Still prouder more ecstatic rose the chant | J2 |
As if the heirs the Deities of the West | K2 |
Joining with master tongue bore part | L2 |
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Not wan from Asia's fetishes | G2 |
Nor red from Europe's old dynastic slaughter house | G2 |
Area of murder plots of thrones with scent left yet of wars and | M2 |
scaffolds every where | B |
But come from Nature's long and harmless throes peacefully builded | M2 |
thence | G2 |
These virgin lands Lands of the Western Shore | N2 |
To the new Culminating Man to you the Empire New | P |
You promis'd long we pledge we dedicate | M2 |
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You occult deep volitions | G2 |
You average Spiritual Manhood purpose of all pois'd on yourself | O2 |
giving not taking law | P2 |
You Womanhood divine mistress and source of all whence life and | M2 |
love and aught that comes from life and love | Q2 |
You unseen Moral Essence of all the vast materials of America age | R2 |
upon age working in Death the same as Life | S2 |
You that sometimes known oftener unknown really shape and mould | M2 |
the New World adjusting it to Time and Space | G2 |
You hidden National Will lying in your abysms conceal'd but ever | V |
alert | M2 |
You past and present purposes tenaciously pursued may be | K |
unconscious of yourselves | G2 |
Unswerv'd by all the passing errors perturbations of the surface | G2 |
You vital universal deathless germs beneath all creeds arts | G2 |
statutes literatures | G2 |
Here build your homes for good establish here These areas entire | V |
Lands of the Western Shore | N2 |
We pledge we dedicate to you | P |
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For man of you your characteristic Race | G2 |
Here may be hardy sweet gigantic grow here tower proportionate to | P |
Nature | V |
Here climb the vast pure spaces unconfined uncheck'd by wall or | N2 |
roof | T2 |
Here laugh with storm or sun here joy here patiently inure | U2 |
Here heed himself unfold himself not others' formulas heed here | V2 |
fill his time | C2 |
To duly fall to aid unreck'd at last | M2 |
To disappear to serve | W2 |
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Thus on the northern coast | M2 |
In the echo of teamsters' calls and the clinking chains and the | X2 |
music of choppers' axes | G2 |
The falling trunk and limbs the crash the muffled shriek the | X2 |
groan | Y2 |
Such words combined from the Redwood tree as of wood spirits' voices | G2 |
ecstatic ancient and rustling | C |
The century lasting unseen dryads singing withdrawing | C |
All their recesses of forests and mountains leaving | C |
From the Cascade range to the Wasatch or Idaho far or Utah | P2 |
To the deities of the Modern henceforth yielding | C |
The chorus and indications the vistas of coming humanity the | X2 |
settlements features all | Z2 |
In the Mendocino woods I caught | M2 |
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The flashing and golden pageant of California | X2 |
The sudden and gorgeous drama the sunny and ample lands | G2 |
The long and varied stretch from Puget Sound to Colorado south | A3 |
Lands bathed in sweeter rarer healthier air valleys and mountain | F |
cliffs | G2 |
The fields of Nature long prepared and fallow the silent cyclic | B3 |
chemistry | K |
The slow and steady ages plodding the unoccupied surface ripening | C |
the rich ores forming beneath | C3 |
At last the New arriving assuming taking possession | F |
A swarming and busy race settling and organizing every where | B |
Ships coming in from the whole round world and going out to the | X2 |
whole world | M2 |
To India and China and Australia and the thousand island paradises | G2 |
of the Pacific | B3 |
Populous cities the latest inventions the steamers on the rivers | G2 |
the railroads with many a thrifty farm with machinery | K |
And wool and wheat and the grape and diggings of yellow gold | M2 |
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But more in you than these Lands of the Western Shore | N2 |
These but the means the implements the standing ground | M2 |
I see in you certain to come the promise of thousands of years | G2 |
till now deferr'd | M2 |
Promis'd to be fulfill'd our common kind the Race | G2 |
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The New Society at last proportionate to Nature | V |
In Man of you more than your mountain peaks or stalwart trees | G2 |
imperial | D3 |
In Woman more far more than all your gold or vines or even vital | D3 |
air | B |
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Fresh come to a New World indeed yet long prepared | M2 |
I see the Genius of the Modern child of the Real and Ideal | E3 |
Clearing the ground for broad humanity the true America heir of the | X2 |
past so grand | M2 |
To build a grander future | V |
Walt Whitman
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