A Dramatic Poem Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BCCDEFGAHIJKLMNOPQPL RLSTULPVLLLWPPXLYZXP LA2B2IC2APD2MIE2PLUA F2G2LUMH2G2I2J2G2K2Q LL2G2LLPMLM2MH2AH2PA LN2LH2LK2AUXO2AXYPA2 LIQIP2LQ2R2F2S2ZLT2U 2H2T2PLV2W2F2X2MLAPP Y2Z2LA3B3C3F2LD3LE3L PYLPIYPLF3G3LCPPPF2L IAH3LLIQ2PPAALKLAMI3 J3F2K2LQ2LLLK3MC3L3M V2ALLG2G2LLKe mast with a large square sail hiding a great deal of the sky and sea on that side The tiller is at the left of the stage it is a long oar coming through an opening in the bulwark The deck rises in a series of steps hehind the tiller and the stern of the ship curves overhead When the play opens there are four persons upon the deck Aibric stands by the tiller Forgael sleeps upon the raised portion of the deck towards the front of the stage Two Sailors are standing near to the mast on which a harp is hanging | A |
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First Sailor Has he not led us into these waste seas | B |
For long enough | C |
Second Sailor Aye long and long enough | C |
First Sailor We have not come upon a shore or ship | D |
These dozen weeks | E |
Sccond Sailor And I had thought to make | F |
A good round Sum upon this cruise and turn | G |
For I am getting on in life to something | A |
That has less ups and downs than robbery | H |
First Sailor I am so tired of being bachelor | I |
I could give all my heart to that Red Moll | J |
That had but the one eye | K |
Second Sailor Can no bewitchment | L |
Transform these rascal billows into women | M |
That I may drown myself | N |
First Sailor Better steer home | O |
Whether he will or no and better still | P |
To take him while he sleeps and carry him | Q |
And drop him from the gunnel | P |
Second Sailor I dare not do it | L |
Were't not that there is magic in his harp | R |
I would be of your mind but when he plays it | L |
Strange creatures flutter up before one's eyes | S |
Or cry about one's ears | T |
First Sailor Nothing to fear | U |
Second Sailor Do you remember when we sank that | L |
galley | P |
At the full moon | V |
First Sailor He played all through the night | L |
Second Sailor Until the moon had set and when I looked | L |
Where the dead drifted I could see a bird | L |
Like a grey gull upon the breast of each | W |
While I was looking they rose hurriedly | P |
And after circling with strange cries awhile | P |
Flew westward and many a time since then | X |
I've heard a rustling overhead in the wind | L |
First Sailor I saw them on that night as well as you | Y |
But when I had eaten and drunk myself asleep | Z |
My courage came again | X |
Second Sailor But that's not all | P |
The other night while he was playing it | L |
A beautiful young man and girl came up | A2 |
In a white breaking wave they had the look | B2 |
Of those that are alive for ever and ever | I |
First Sailor I saw them too one night Forgael was | C2 |
playing | A |
And they were listening ther beyond the sail | P |
He could not see them but I held out my hands | D2 |
To grasp the woman | M |
Second Sailor You have dared to touch her | I |
First Sailor O she was but a shadow and slipped from | E2 |
me | P |
Second Sailor But were you not afraid | L |
First Sailor Why should I fear | U |
Second Sailor 'Twas Aengus and Edain the wandering | A |
lovers | F2 |
To whom all lovers pray | G2 |
First Sailor But what of that | L |
A shadow does not carry sword or spear | U |
Second Sailor My mother told me that there is not one | M |
Of the Ever living half so dangerous | H2 |
As that wild Aengus Long before her day | G2 |
He carried Edain off from a king's house | I2 |
And hid her among fruits of jewel stone | J2 |
And in a tower of glass and from that day | G2 |
Has hated every man that's not in love | K2 |
And has been dangerous to him | Q |
First Sailor I have heard | L |
He does not hate seafarers as he hates | L2 |
Peaceable men that shut the wind away | G2 |
And keep to the one weary marriage bed | L |
Second Sailor I think that he has Forgael in his net | L |
And drags him through the sea | P |
First Sailor Well net or none | M |
I'd drown him while we have the chance to do it | L |
Second Sailor It's certain I'd sleep easier o' nights | M2 |
If he were dead but who will be our captain | M |
Judge of the stars and find a course for us | H2 |
First Sailor I've thought of that We must have Aibric | A |
with us | H2 |
For he can judge the stars as well as Forgael | P |
Going towards Aibric | A |
Become our captain Aibric I am resolved | L |
To make an end of Forgael while he sleeps | N2 |
There's not a man but will be glad of it | L |
When it is over nor one to grumble at us | H2 |
Aibric You have taken pay and made your bargain for it | L |
First Sailor What good is there in this hard way of | K2 |
living | A |
Unless we drain more flagons in a year | U |
And kiss more lips than lasting peaceable men | X |
In their long lives Will you be of our troop | O2 |
And take the captain's share of everything | A |
And bring us into populous seas again | X |
Aibric Be of your troop Aibric be one of you | Y |
And Forgael in the other scale kill Forgael | P |
And he my master from my childhood up | A2 |
If you will draw that sword out of its scabbard | L |
I'll give my answer | I |
First Sailor You have awakened him | Q |
To Second Sailor | I |
We'd better go for we have lost this chance | P2 |
They go out | L |
Forgael Have the birds passed us I could hear your | Q2 |
voice | R2 |
But there were others | F2 |
Aibric I have seen nothing pass | S2 |
Forgael You're certain of it I never wake from sleep | Z |
But that I am afraid they may have passed | L |
For they're my only pilots If I lost them | T2 |
Straying too far into the north or south | U2 |
I'd never come upon the happiness | H2 |
That has been promised me I have not seen them | T2 |
These many days and yet there must be many | P |
Dying at every moment in the world | L |
And flying towards their peace | V2 |
Aibric Put by these thoughts | W2 |
And listen to me for a while The sailors | F2 |
Are plotting for your death | X2 |
Forgael Have I not given | M |
More riches than they ever hoped to find | L |
And now they will not follow while I seek | A |
The only riches that have hit my fancy | P |
Aibric What riches can you find in this waste sea | P |
Where no ship sails where nothing that's alive | Y2 |
Has ever come but those man headed birds | Z2 |
Knowing it for the world's end | L |
Forgael Where the world ends | A3 |
The mind is made unchanging for it finds | B3 |
Miracle ecstasy the impossible hope | C3 |
The flagstone under all the fire of fires | F2 |
The roots of the world | L |
Aibric Shadows before now | D3 |
Have driven travellers mad for their own sport | L |
Forgael Do you too doubt me Have you joined their | E3 |
plot | L |
Aibric No no do not say that You know right well | P |
That I will never lift a hand against you | Y |
Forgael Why should you be more faithful than the rest | L |
Being as doubtful | P |
Aibric I have called you master | I |
Too many years to lift a hand against you | Y |
Forgael Maybe it is but natural to doubt me | P |
You've never known I'd lay a wager on it | L |
A melancholy that a cup of wine | F3 |
A lucky battle or a woman's kiss | G3 |
Could not amend | L |
Aibric I have good spirits enough | C |
Forgael If you will give me all your mind awhile | P |
All all the very bottom of the bowl | P |
I'll show you that I am made differently | P |
That nothing can amend it but these waters | F2 |
Where I am rid of life the events of the world | L |
What do you call it that old promise breaker | I |
The cozening fortune teller that comes whispering | A |
'You will have all you have wished for when you have | H3 |
earned | L |
Land for your children or money in a pot | L |
And when we have it we are no happier | I |
Because of that old draught under the door | Q2 |
Or creaky shoes And at the end of all | P |
How are we better off than Seaghan the fool | P |
That never did a hand's turn Aibric Aibric | A |
We have fallen in the dreams the Ever living | A |
Breathe on the burnished mirror of the world | L |
And then smooth out with ivory hands and sigh | K |
And find their laughter sweeter to the taste | L |
For that brief sighing | A |
Aibric If you had loved some woman | M |
Forgael You say that also You have heard the voices | I3 |
For that is what they say all all the shadows | J3 |
Aengus and Edain those passionate wanderers | F2 |
And all the others but it must be love | K2 |
As they have known it Now the secret's out | L |
For it is love that I am seeking for | Q2 |
But of a beautiful unheard of kind | L |
That is not in the world | L |
Aibric And yet the world | L |
Has beautiful women to please every man | K3 |
Forgael But he that gets their love after the fashion | M |
'Loves in brief longing and deceiving hope | C3 |
And bodily tenderness and finds that even | L3 |
The bed of love that in the imagination | M |
Had seemed to be the giver of all peace | V2 |
Is no more than a wine cup in the tasting | A |
And as soon finished | L |
Aibric All that ever loved | L |
Have loved that way there is no other way | G2 |
Forgael Yet never have two lovers kissed but they | G2 |
believed there was some other near at hand | L |
And almost wept because they could not find it | L |
Ai | K |
William Butler Yeats
(1)
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