The Centenarian's Story Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDA EFGHH IJHDKHLHF IMJ D NOIPHQHRS SHTUVHH DWXA YANH J HA JHZA2 A2B2J HC2HA JD2JE2 NJF2 JJ AAJA B2D JAY MDG2A VFU ODNH2 I2D ADD A AOF OOA OOD DOAAE2J2AA OD OOGive me your hand old Revolutionary | A |
The hill top is nigh but a few steps make room gentlemen | B |
Up the path you have follow'd me well spite of your hundred and extra years | C |
You can walk old man though your eyes are almost done | D |
Your faculties serve you and presently I must have them serve me | A |
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Rest while I tell what the crowd around us means | E |
On the plain below recruits are drilling and exercising | F |
There is the camp one regiment departs to morrow | G |
Do you hear the officers giving the orders | H |
Do you hear the clank of the muskets | H |
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Why what comes over you now old man | I |
Why do you tremble and clutch my hand so convulsively | J |
The troops are but drilling they are yet surrounded with smiles | H |
Around them at hand the well drest friends and the women | D |
While splendid and warm the afternoon sun shines down | K |
Green the midsummer verdure and fresh blows the dallying breeze | H |
O'er proud and peaceful cities and arm of the sea between | L |
But drill and parade are over they march back to quarters | H |
Only hear that approval of hands hear what a clapping | F |
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As wending the crowds now part and disperse but we old man | I |
Not for nothing have I brought you hither we must remain | M |
You to speak in your turn and I to listen and tell | J |
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THE CENTENARIAN | D |
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When I clutch'd your hand it was not with terror | N |
But suddenly pouring about me here on every side | O |
And below there where the boys were drilling and up the slopes they ran | I |
And where tents are pitch'd and wherever you see south and south east and south west | P |
Over hills across lowlands and in the skirts of woods | H |
And along the shores in mire now fill'd over came again and suddenly raged | Q |
As eighty five years agone no mere parade receiv'd with applause of friends | H |
But a battle which I took part in myself aye long ago as it is I took part in it | R |
Walking then this hill top this same ground | S |
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Aye this is the ground | S |
My blind eyes even as I speak behold it re peopled from graves | H |
The years recede pavements and stately houses disappear | T |
Rude forts appear again the old hoop'd guns are mounted | U |
I see the lines of rais'd earth stretching from river to bay | V |
I mark the vista of waters I mark the uplands and slopes | H |
Here we lay encamp'd it was this time in summer also | H |
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As I talk I remember all I remember the Declaration | D |
It was read here the whole army paraded it was read to us here | W |
By his staff surrounded the General stood in the middle he held up his unsheath'd sword | X |
It glitter'd in the sun in full sight of the army | A |
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'Twas a bold act then | Y |
The English war ships had just arrived the king had sent them from over the sea | A |
We could watch down the lower bay where they lay at anchor | N |
And the transports swarming with soldiers | H |
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A few days more and they landed and then the battle | J |
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Twenty thousand were brought against us | H |
A veteran force furnish'd with good artillery | A |
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I tell not now the whole of the battle | J |
But one brigade early in the forenoon order'd forward to engage the red coats | H |
Of that brigade I tell and how steadily it march'd | Z |
And how long and how well it stood confronting death | A2 |
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Who do you think that was marching steadily sternly confronting death | A2 |
It was the brigade of the youngest men two thousand strong | B2 |
Rais'd in Virginia and Maryland and many of them known personally to the General | J |
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Jauntily forward they went with quick step toward Gowanus' waters | H |
Till of a sudden unlook'd for by defiles through the woods gain'd at night | C2 |
The British advancing wedging in from the east fiercely playing their guns | H |
That brigade of the youngest was cut off and at the enemy's mercy | A |
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The General watch'd them from this hill | J |
They made repeated desperate attempts to burst their environment | D2 |
Then drew close together very compact their flag flying in the middle | J |
But O from the hills how the cannon were thinning and thinning them | E2 |
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It sickens me yet that slaughter | N |
I saw the moisture gather in drops on the face of the General | J |
I saw how he wrung his hands in anguish | F2 |
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Meanwhile the British maneuver'd to draw us out for a pitch'd battle | J |
But we dared not trust the chances of a pitch'd battle | J |
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We fought the fight in detachments | A |
Sallying forth we fought at several points but in each the luck was against us | A |
Our foe advancing steadily getting the best of it push'd us back to the works on this hill | J |
Till we turn'd menacing here and then he left us | A |
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That was the going out of the brigade of the youngest men two thousand strong | B2 |
Few return'd nearly all remain in Brooklyn | D |
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That and here my General's first battle | J |
No women looking on nor sunshine to bask in it did not conclude with applause | A |
Nobody clapp'd hands here then | Y |
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But in darkness in mist on the ground under a chill rain | M |
Wearied that night we lay foil'd and sullen | D |
While scornfully laugh'd many an arrogant lord off against us encamp'd | G2 |
Quite within hearing feasting klinking wine glasses together over their victory | A |
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So dull and damp and another day | V |
But the night of that mist lifting rain ceasing | F |
Silent as a ghost while they thought they were sure of him my General retreated | U |
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I saw him at the river side | O |
Down by the ferry lit by torches hastening the embarcation | D |
My General waited till the soldiers and wounded were all pass'd over | N |
And then it was just ere sunrise these eyes rested on him for the last time | H2 |
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Every one else seem'd fill'd with gloom | I2 |
Many no doubt thought of capitulation | D |
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But when my General pass'd me | A |
As he stood in his boat and look'd toward the coming sun | D |
I saw something different from capitulation | D |
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TERMINUS | A |
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Enough the Centenarian's story ends | A |
The two the past and present have interchanged | O |
I myself as connecter as chansonnier of a great future am now speaking | F |
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And is this the ground Washington trod | O |
And these waters I listlessly daily cross are these the waters he cross'd | O |
As resolute in defeat as other generals in their proudest triumphs | A |
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It is well a lesson like that always comes good | O |
I must copy the story and send it eastward and westward | O |
I must preserve that look as it beam'd on you rivers of Brooklyn | D |
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See as the annual round returns the phantoms return | D |
It is the th of August and the British have landed | O |
The battle begins and goes against us behold through the smoke Washington's face | A |
The brigade of Virginia and Maryland have march'd forth to intercept the enemy | A |
They are cut off murderous artillery from the hills plays upon them | E2 |
Rank after rank falls while over them silently droops the flag | J2 |
Baptized that day in many a young man's bloody wounds | A |
In death defeat and sisters' mothers' tears | A |
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Ah hills and slopes of Brooklyn I perceive you are more valuable than your owners supposed | O |
Ah river henceforth you will be illumin'd to me at sunrise with something besides the sun | D |
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Encampments new in the midst of you stands an encampment very old | O |
Stands forever the camp of the dead brigade | O |
Walt Whitman
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