Monument Mountain Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGHIJKLDMNOPPQP RJSTUAVWPXYXZA2PRPXH B2C2XPD2E2F2PG2 PH2B2I2J2E2K2XL2M2N2 PL2IO2P2Q2XPR2S2HPT2 U2E2PPPV2 W2PX2H2Y2Z2W2W2PPXPP XW2W2 W2PPA3W2W2W2B3W2C3D3 SE3PM2F3W2A3PPPW2PG3 H2PB2D2W2H3I3E3XA3X2 W2X2W2J3W2M2W2W2Thou who wouldst see the lovely and the wild | A |
Mingled in harmony on Nature's face | B |
Ascend our rocky mountains Let thy foot | C |
Fail not with weariness for on their tops | D |
The beauty and the majesty of earth | E |
Spread wide beneath shall make thee to forget | F |
The steep and toilsome way There as thou stand'st | G |
The haunts of men below thee and around | H |
The mountain summits thy expanding heart | I |
Shall feel a kindred with that loftier world | J |
To which thou art translated and partake | K |
The enlargement of thy vision Thou shalt look | L |
Upon the green and rolling forest tops | D |
And down into the secrets of the glens | M |
And streams that with their bordering thickets strive | N |
To hide their windings Thou shalt gaze at once | O |
Here on white villages and tilth and herds | P |
And swarming roads and there on solitudes | P |
That only hear the torrent and the wind | Q |
And eagle's shriek There is a precipice | P |
That seems a fragment of some mighty wall | R |
Built by the hand that fashioned the old world | J |
To separate its nations and thrown down | S |
When the flood drowned them To the north a path | T |
Conducts you up the narrow battlement | U |
Steep is the western side shaggy and wild | A |
With mossy trees and pinnacles of flint | V |
And many a hanging crag But to the east | W |
Sheer to the vale go down the bare old cliffs | P |
Huge pillars that in middle heaven upbear | X |
Their weather beaten capitals here dark | Y |
With the thick moss of centuries and there | X |
Of chalky whiteness where the thunderbolt | Z |
Has splintered them It is a fearful thing | A2 |
To stand upon the beetling verge and see | P |
Where storm and lightning from that huge gray wall | R |
Have tumbled down vast blocks and at the base | P |
Dashed them in fragments and to lay thine ear | X |
Over the dizzy depth and hear the sound | H |
Of winds that struggle with the woods below | B2 |
Come up like ocean murmurs But the scene | C2 |
Is lovely round a beautiful river there | X |
Wanders amid the fresh and fertile meads | P |
The paradise he made unto himself | D2 |
Mining the soil for ages On each side | E2 |
The fields swell upward to the hills beyond | F2 |
Above the hills in the blue distance rise | P |
The mighty columns with which earth props heaven | G2 |
- | |
There is a tale about these reverend rocks | P |
A sad tradition of unhappy love | H2 |
And sorrows borne and ended long ago | B2 |
When over these fair vales the savage sought | I2 |
His game in the thick woods There was a maid | J2 |
The fairest of the Indian maids bright eyed | E2 |
With wealth of raven tresses a light form | K2 |
And a gay heart About her cabin door | X |
The wide old woods resounded with her song | L2 |
And fairy laughter all the summer day | M2 |
She loved her cousin such a love was deemed | N2 |
By the morality of those stern tribes | P |
Incestuous and she struggled hard and long | L2 |
Against her love and reasoned with her heart | I |
As simple Indian maiden might In vain | O2 |
Then her eye lost its lustre and her step | P2 |
Its lightness and the gray haired men that passed | Q2 |
Her dwelling wondered that they heard no more | X |
The accustomed song and laugh of her whose looks | P |
Were like the cheerful smile of Spring they said | R2 |
Upon the Winter of their age She went | S2 |
To weep where no eye saw and was not found | H |
When all the merry girls were met to dance | P |
And all the hunters of the tribe were out | T2 |
Nor when they gathered from the rustling husk | U2 |
The shining ear nor when by the river's side | E2 |
Thay pulled the grape and startled the wild shades | P |
With sounds of mirth The keen eyed Indian dames | P |
Would whisper to each other as they saw | P |
Her wasting form and say the girl will die | V2 |
- | |
One day into the bosom of a friend | W2 |
A playmate of her young and innocent years | P |
She poured her griefs Thou know'st and thou alone | X2 |
She said for I have told thee all my love | H2 |
And guilt and sorrow I am sick of life | Y2 |
All night I weep in darkness and the morn | Z2 |
Glares on me as upon a thing accursed | W2 |
That has no business on the earth I hate | W2 |
The pastimes and the pleasant toils that once | P |
I loved the cheerful voices of my friends | P |
Have an unnatural horror in mine ear | X |
In dreams my mother from the land of souls | P |
Calls me and chides me All that look on me | P |
Do seem to know my shame I cannot bear | X |
Their eyes I cannot from my heart root out | W2 |
The love that wrings it so and I must die | W2 |
- | |
It was a summer morning and they went | W2 |
To this old precipice About the cliffs | P |
Lay garlands ears of maize and shaggy skins | P |
Of wolf and bear the offerings of the tribe | A3 |
Here made to the Great Spirit for they deemed | W2 |
Like worshippers of the elder time that God | W2 |
Doth walk on the high places and affect | W2 |
The earth o'erlooking mountains She had on | B3 |
The ornaments with which her father loved | W2 |
To deck the beauty of his bright eyed girl | C3 |
And bade her wear when stranger warriors came | D3 |
To be his guests Here the friends sat them down | S |
And sang all day old songs of love and death | E3 |
And decked the poor wan victim's hair with flowers | P |
And prayed that safe and swift might be her way | M2 |
To the calm world of sunshine where no grief | F3 |
Makes the heart heavy and the eyelids red | W2 |
Beautiful lay the region of her tribe | A3 |
Below her waters resting in the embrace | P |
Of the wide forest and maize planted glades | P |
Opening amid the leafy wilderness | P |
She gazed upon it long and at the sight | W2 |
Of her own village peeping through the trees | P |
And her own dwelling and the cabin roof | G3 |
Of him she loved with an unlawful love | H2 |
And came to die for a warm gush of tears | P |
Ran from her eyes But when the sun grew low | B2 |
And the hill shadows long she threw herself | D2 |
From the steep rock and perished There was scooped | W2 |
Upon the mountain's southern slope a grave | H3 |
And there they laid her in the very garb | I3 |
With which the maiden decked herself for death | E3 |
With the same withering wild flowers in her hair | X |
And o'er the mould that covered her the tribe | A3 |
Built up a simple monument a cone | X2 |
Of small loose stones Thenceforward all who passed | W2 |
Hunter and dame and virgin laid a stone | X2 |
In silence on the pile It stands there yet | W2 |
And Indians from the distant West who come | J3 |
To visit where their fathers' bones are laid | W2 |
Yet tell the sorrowful tale and to this day | M2 |
The mountain where the hapless maiden died | W2 |
Is called the Mountain of the Monument | W2 |
William Cullen Bryant
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