The Wanderer-s Return Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBCCDEFFGHIIJKLLMJ CN OOPPQQII RRSSTTUUVVWWXXYZ A2TB2B2BBPPC2C2D2E2F 2F2MJG2G2 H2I2I2J2K2 LLCCL2L2L2L2L2L2M2M2 TH2PPB2B2N2N2O2O2BBP 2Q2J2R2LLS2S2T2T2 L2L2M2U2L2L2L2L2TTV2 V2L2L2VVW2TQ2VX2X2L2 L2L2L2Y2Y2L2L2Z2A3B3 B3C3D3 E3E3F3F3X2X2CCG3G3H3 CCL2L2I3I3J3J3U2U2A3 Z2F2F2L2L2KKB3B3K3 L2L2TW2L2L3An old heart's mourning is a hideous thing | A |
And weeds upon an aged weeper cling | A |
Like night upon a grave The city there | B |
Gaunt as a woman who has once been fair | B |
Lay black with winter and the silent rain | C |
Fell thro' the heavens darkly like a stain | C |
Upon her face The dusky houses rose | D |
Unlovely shapes laid naked on the ooze | E |
Grimed with long sooty tears The night fell down | F |
And gathered all the highways in its frown | F |
This was my home I saw men pass and pass | G |
Nor stop to look into a neighbour's face | H |
I dared not look in their's because my eyes | I |
Were faint and travel jarred and would not rise | I |
From the dull earth and hunger made them dim | J |
The hunger of a seven years' angry dream | K |
Of love and peace and home unsatisfied | L |
And now my heart thus grievously denied | L |
Rose like a caged bird in the nesting time | M |
Who beats against the bars that prison him | J |
In all its greenness of youth's wounds and pain | C |
And would not cease till these should bleed again | N |
- | |
For I had gone a hunter through the world | O |
And set my tent in every land and hurled | O |
My spears at life because my joys were dead | P |
And many a fair field of the Earth was red | P |
Where I had passed and many a wind might tell | Q |
Of stricken souls that to my arrows fell | Q |
I would not stop to listen to their cries | I |
But went my way and thought that I was wise | I |
- | |
A wanderer's life whether his lone chase be man | R |
Or only those poor outlaws under ban | R |
The creatures of the field his hand destroys | S |
Through rage of wantonness or need of noise | S |
Is the fierce solace of its anger given | T |
To a hurt soul which dares not turn to Heaven | T |
With me it was a vengeance of love lost | U |
A refuge proved for passions tempest tossed | U |
An unguent for despairs that could not kill | V |
I wandered in the desert and the hill | V |
Seeking dry places and behold my grief | W |
Fled with my footprints and I found relief | W |
And it had happened to me as befalls | X |
Men bred in cities who have left their walls | X |
For gain or pleasure that the wilderness | Y |
Grew lastly wearisome I loved it less | Z |
- | |
And once a desperate chase had led me on | A2 |
To an unknown land when daylight was near done | T |
And I sat weary by my slaughtered prey | B2 |
And watched the cranes which northward fled away | B2 |
Rank upon rank into the depths of air | B |
And still the horizon lifeless vast and bare | B |
Stretched wide around and like a vault of dread | P |
The arch of heaven hemmed me overhead | P |
And the great eye of the dead beast was set | C2 |
Upon my own I felt my cheek was wet | C2 |
Oh surely then for all man's heart be hard | D2 |
Though he have taken Nature by the beard | E2 |
And lived alone as to the manner born | F2 |
And though his limbs be strung with toil and worn | F2 |
To all Earth's dangers yet at such a time | M |
His coward soul will overmaster him | J |
Saying Beware thou child of Earth even now | G2 |
Look at the world how wide it is and thou | G2 |
How small And thou hast dared to be alone '' | - |
And lo the last long flight of cranes was gone | H2 |
And darkness with its folding pity crept | I2 |
Over the plain I hid my face and wept | I2 |
Till sleep fell on me But when dawn was come | J2 |
I turned my steps to what had been my home | K2 |
- | |
The palace gardens I had fled aside | L |
From the gaunt streets in easement of my pride | L |
After the lamps were lit for to my brain | C |
The tumult and the passers by were pain | C |
The gardens where in those far summer times | L2 |
A boy I came to watch the pantomimes | L2 |
Among a laughing crowd of white capped bonnes | L2 |
And red cheeked children and loud country clowns | L2 |
Or where along the wall in graver sense | L2 |
And screened from winds in their petite Provence | L2 |
With the first chestnut blossoms old men sat | M2 |
And cheered their melancholy souls with chat | M2 |
Thawing like frozen apples in the sun | T |
The old men and the children all were gone | H2 |
The leaves their canopy lay torn and dead | P |
And crushed in spongy heaps beneath my tread | P |
The fountains recreant to their laughter lay | B2 |
Murk pools of silence shrouded from the day | B2 |
As though no doves had ever at their brink | N2 |
Stooped in full June to plume themselves and drink | N2 |
Only the trees stood witness of the past | O2 |
Sad trees I greeted them I held them fast | O2 |
Like a friend's hands They were as changed and bare | B |
As my own life but calm in the despair | B |
Of their long winter's martyrdom and I | P2 |
A very child in my philosophy | Q2 |
Till I remembered that no Spring would come | J2 |
To mock the winter of my own long doom | R2 |
With any merriment And Trees'' I cried | L |
Your hearts within are all too greenly dyed | L |
To match with mine '' I let their branches go | S2 |
And sat upon a bench to feed my woe | S2 |
With memories long hidden out of mind | T2 |
But which trooped back that night and rode the wind | T2 |
- | |
These wooden benches what sad ghosts of pleasures | L2 |
Had used them nightly crouching o'er their treasures | L2 |
My own long murdered joys since there we sat | M2 |
Blind in our love and insolent to Fate | U2 |
Each one a witness proved of our lost vows | L2 |
Our prayers our protests all our souls' carouse | L2 |
Each one inscribed through the unheeding years | L2 |
With letters of a name I wrote in tears | L2 |
'Twas here I saw her first a pure sweet woman | T |
Fair as a goddess but with smile all human | T |
Her children at her knees who went and came | V2 |
At each new wayward impulse of their game | V2 |
And she reproving with her quiet eyes | L2 |
Veiling the mirth they could not all disguise | L2 |
The echo of her voice with its mute thrill | V |
Lived in these glades and stirred my pulses still | V |
Though I had lived to hear it in what tone | W2 |
Of passionate grief and souls' disunion | T |
She stood a broken lily by that tree | Q2 |
Sunlight and shade for ever changingly | V |
Chequering the robe she wore of virgin white | X2 |
When first I touched the goal of my delight | X2 |
Her woman's hand and hid it in my hands | L2 |
Here shone the glory of her countenance | L2 |
Nobler for tears when weakness for a space | L2 |
Held full dominion in that heaven her face | L2 |
And she confessed herself of grief divine | Y2 |
And love grown young a vintage of new wine | Y2 |
And I was crowned her king O silent trees | L2 |
You heard it and you know how to the lees | L2 |
We drained the cup of life and found it good | Z2 |
Gathering love's manna for our daily food | A3 |
In scorn of the vain rest You heard and knew | B3 |
What the world only guessed where all was true | B3 |
And have you dreamed on in your quiet grove | C3 |
While seven years were built against our love | D3 |
- | |
'Twas on this bench I sat that day of June | E3 |
Thinking of death a whole sweet afternoon | E3 |
Till I was sick of sorrow and my tongue | F3 |
Weary of its long silence I was young | F3 |
And the birds sang so loud and when the night | X2 |
Came as it now came and the lamps grew bright | X2 |
In the long street lit like a diamond chain | C |
I rose and said I will not bear the pain | C |
What is my pride worth that for it this smart | G3 |
Should harrow up the green things of my heart | G3 |
For twelve importunate hours in such a sort | H3 |
And pleasure is so sweet and life so short '' | - |
And as a martyr who long time has lain | C |
Frozen in a dungeon sees amid his pain | C |
When he has fasted on for many days | L2 |
Bright visions of hot feasts and hearths ablaze | L2 |
With welcome and who sells his gloomy creed | I3 |
And is overcome of pleasure so my need | I3 |
Conquered my pride and I arose and went | J3 |
Striding with smiles at my new found intent | J3 |
Down these same gravel alleys to the gate | U2 |
And so beyond like one inebriate | U2 |
Thinking the while of the brave baths and food | A3 |
Set for the renegade until I stood | Z2 |
Once more before her door I had forsworn | F2 |
I did not stop to question thoughts forlorn | F2 |
But knocked as I had knocked a thousand times | L2 |
St Roch's was ringing its last evening chimes | L2 |
And I still thought about the martyr's dream | K |
I saw the light within the threshold gleam | K |
Which opened to me and the voice I knew | B3 |
Said in all sweetness as the door swung to | B3 |
Come We are just in time How fortunate | K3 |
You too like me have happened to be late '' | - |
I swear I said no word of the sad plans | L2 |
I had plotted on this bench of ignorance | L2 |
There have been kings called happy but not one | T |
As I that night Ah God to be alone | W2 |
Alone and never more to hear her voice | L2 |
Calling me ba | L3 |
Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
(1)
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