The Gift Of Harun Al-rashid Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: ABCDCEFGGHIJKLMNLOPQ RSCTLUNVLMGWXYMZGA2L B2GWC2LD2E2LLLF2LZLL G2ZZH2JD2I2GLJ2K2LJ2 L2ZLGM2VAKIZN2O2P2J2 Q2LCR2J2YZJ2LLJ2AYZS 2T2LU2ZV2LAV2W2O2X2Y 2ZZ2A3B3O2KRGC3D3V2A D3GE3F3G3LLH3D3O2LI3 J3O2AK3L3M3N3O3O2P3Z 2CQ3O2P3K2LLF3R3S3A3 T3U3O2RZ2AM3AGAAAM3L ALY2LZ2LAV3VLLLLLAAL W3JZ2LLA

KUSTA BEN LUKA is my name I writeA
To Abd Al Rabban fellow roysterer onceB
Now the good Caliph's learned TreasurerC
And for no ear but hisD
Carry this letterC
Through the great gallery of the Treasure HouseE
Where banners of the Caliphs hang night colouredF
But brilliant as the night's embroideryG
And wait war's music pass the little galleryG
Pass books of learning from ByzantiumH
Written in gold upon a purple stainI
And pause at last I was about to sayJ
At the great book of Sappho's song but noK
For should you leave my letter there a boy'sL
Love lorn indifferent hands might come upon itM
And let it fall unnoticed to the floorN
pause at the Treatise of parmenidesL
And hide it there for Caiphs to world's endO
Must keep that perfect as they keep her songP
So great its fameQ
When fitting time has passedR
The parchment will disclose to some learned manS
A mystery that else had found no chroniclerC
But the wild Bedouin Though I approveT
Those wanderers that welcomed in their tentsL
What great Harun Al Rashid occupiedU
With Persian embassy or Grecian warN
Must needs neglect I cannot hide the truthV
That wandering in a desert featurelessL
As air under a wing can give birds' witM
In after time they will speak much of meG
And speak but fantasy Recall the yearW
When our beloved Caliph put to deathX
His Vizir Jaffer for an unknown reasonY
'If but the shirt upon my body knew itM
I'd tear it off and throw it in the fire 'Z
That speech was all that the town knew but heG
Seemed for a while to have grown young againA2
Seemed so on purpose muttered Jaffer's friendsL
That none might know that he was conscience struckB2
But that s a traitor's thought Enough for meG
That in the early summer of the yearW
The mightiest of the princes of the worldC2
Came to the least considered of his courtiersL
Sat down upon the fountain's marble edgeD2
One hand amid the goldfish in the poolE2
And thereupon a colloquy took placeL
That I commend to all the chroniclersL
To show how violent great hearts can loseL
Their bitterness and find the honeycombF2
'I have brought a slender bride into the houseL
You know the saying ''Change the bride with spring ''Z
And she and I being sunk in happinessL
Cannot endure to think you tread these pathsL
When evening stirs the jasmine bough and yetG2
Are brideless 'Z
'I am falling into years 'Z
'But such as you and I do not seem oldH2
Like men who live by habit Every dayJ
I ride with falcon to the river's edgeD2
Or carry the ringed mail upon my backI2
Or court a woman neither enemyG
Game bird nor woman does the same thing twiceL
And so a hunter carries in the eyeJ2
A mimic of youth Can poet's thoughtK2
That springs from body and in body fallsL
Like this pure jet now lost amid blue skyJ2
Now bathing lily leaf and fish's scaleL2
Be mimicry 'Z
'What matter if our soulsL
Are nearer to the surface of the bodyG
Than souls that start no game and turn no rhymeM2
The soul's own youth and not the body's youthV
Shows through our lineaments My candle's brightA
My lantern is too loyal not to showK
That it was made in your great father's reignI
And yet the jasmine season warms our blood 'Z
'Great prince forgive the freedom of my speechN2
You think that love has seasons and you thinkO2
That if the spring bear off what the spring gaveP2
The heart need suffer no defeat but IJ2
Who have accepted the Byzantine faithQ2
That seems unnatural to Arabian mindsL
Think when I choose a bride I choose for everC
And if her eye should not grow bright for mineR2
Or brighten only for some younger eyeJ2
My heart could never turn from daily ruinY
Nor find a remedy 'Z
'But what if IJ2
Have lit upon a woman who so sharesL
Your thirst for those old crabbed mysteriesL
So strains to look beyond Our life an eyeJ2
That never knew that strain would scarce seem brightA
And yet herself can seem youth's very fountainY
Being all brimmed with life 'Z
'Were it but trueS2
I would have found the best that life can giveT2
Companionship in those mysterious thingsL
That make a man's soul or a woman's soulU2
Itself and not some other soul 'Z
'That loveV2
Must needs be in this life and in what followsL
Unchanging and at peace and it is rightA
Every philosopher should praise that loveV2
But I being none can praise its oppositeW2
It makes my passion stronger but to thinkO2
Like passion stirs the peacock and his mateX2
The wild stag and the doe that mouth to mouthY2
Is a man's mockery of the changeless soul 'Z
And thereupon his bounty gave what nowZ2
Can shake more blossom from autumnal chillA3
Than all my bursting springtime knew A girlB3
Perched in some window of her mother's houscO2
Had watched my daily passage to and froK
Had heard impossible history of my pastR
Imagined some impossible historyG
Lived at my side thought time's disfiguring touchC3
Gave but more reason for a woman's careD3
Yet was it love of me or was it loveV2
Of the stark mystery that has dazed my sightA
perplexed her fantasy and planned her careD3
Or did the torchlight of that mysteryG
Pick out my features in such light and shadeE3
Two contemplating passions chose one themeF3
Through sheer bewilderment She had not pacedG3
The garden paths nor counted up the roomsL
Before she had spread a book upon her kneesL
And asked about the pictures or the textH3
And often those first days I saw her stareD3
On old dry writing in a learned tongueO2
On old dry faggots that could never pleaseL
The extravagance of spring or move a handI3
As if that writing or the figured pageJ3
Were some dear cheekO2
Upon a moonless nightA
I sat where I could watch her sleeping formK3
And wrote by candle light but her form movedL3
And fearing that my light disturbed her sleepM3
I rose that I might screen it with a clothN3
I heard her voice 'Turn that I may expoundO3
What's bowed your shoulder and made pale your cheekO2
And saw her sitting upright on the bedP3
Or was it she that spoke or some great DjinnZ2
I say that a Djinn spoke A livelong hourC
She seemed the learned man and I the childQ3
Truths without father came truths that no bookO2
Of all the uncounted books that I have readP3
Nor thought out of her mind or mine begotK2
Self born high born and solitary truthsL
Those terrible implacable straight linesL
Drawn through the wandering vegetative dreamF3
Even those truths that when my bones are dustR3
Must drive the Arabian hostS3
The voice grew stillA3
And she lay down upon her bed and sleptT3
But woke at the first gleam of day rose upU3
And swept the house and sang about her workO2
In childish ignorance of all that passedR
A dozen nights of natural sleep and thenZ2
When the full moon swam to its greatest heightA
She rose and with her eyes shut fast in sleepM3
Walked through the house Unnoticed and unfeltA
I wrapped her in a hooded cloak and sheG
Half running dropped at the first ridge of the desertA
And there marked out those emblems on the sandA
That day by day I study and marvel atA
With her white finger I led her home asleepM3
And once again she rose and swept the houseL
In childish ignorance of all that passedA
Even to day after some seven yearsL
When maybe thrice in every moon her mouthY2
Murmured the wisdom of the desert DjinnsL
She keeps that ignorance nor has she nowZ2
That first unnatural interest in my booksL
It seems enough that I am there and yetA
Old fellow student whose most patient earV3
Heard all the anxiety of my passionate youthV
It seems I must buy knowledge with my peaceL
What if she lose her ignorance and soL
Dream that I love her only for the voiceL
That every gift and every word of praiseL
Is but a payment for that midnight voiceL
That is to age what milk is to a childA
Were she to lose her love because she had lostA
Her confidence in mine or even loseL
Its first simplicity love voice and allW3
All my fine feathers would be plucked awayJ
And I left shivering The voice has drawnZ2
A quality of wisdom from her love'sL
Particular quality The signs and shapesL
All those abstA

William Butler Yeats



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