Rizpah Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCD EFCG H IIAAJJKKLLMMNN IIHHNNOOAAPPQQIIGG HHRRSSNNAA TTUUJJHH VVWWXXJJYY GGNNOOZZHHNNMMAnd he delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites and they | A |
hanged them in the hill before the Lord and they fell all seven | B |
together and were put to death in the days of the harvest in the | C |
first days in the beginning of barley harvest | D |
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And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it for | E |
her upon the rock from the beginning of harvest until the water | F |
dropped upon them out of heaven and suffered neither the birds of the | C |
air to rest upon them by day nor the beasts of the field by night | G |
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SAMUEL xxi | H |
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Hear what the desolate Rizpah said | I |
As on Gibeah's rocks she watched the dead | I |
The sons of Michal before her lay | A |
And her own fair children dearer than they | A |
By a death of shame they all had died | J |
And were stretched on the bare rock side by side | J |
And Rizpah once the loveliest of all | K |
That bloomed and smiled in the court of Saul | K |
All wasted with watching and famine now | L |
And scorched by the sun her haggard brow | L |
Sat mournfully guarding their corpses there | M |
And murmured a strange and solemn air | M |
The low heart broken and wailing strain | N |
Of a mother that mourns her children slain | N |
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I have made the crags my home and spread | I |
On their desert backs my sackcloth bed | I |
I have eaten the bitter herb of the rocks | H |
And drunk the midnight dew in my locks | H |
I have wept till I could not weep and the pain | N |
Of my burning eyeballs went to my brain | N |
Seven blackened corpses before me lie | O |
In the blaze of the sun and the winds of the sky | O |
I have watched them through the burning day | A |
And driven the vulture and raven away | A |
And the cormorant wheeled in circles round | P |
Yet feared to alight on the guarded ground | P |
And when the shadows of twilight came | Q |
I have seen the hyena's eyes of flame | Q |
And heard at my side his stealthy tread | I |
But aye at my shout the savage fled | I |
And I threw the lighted brand to fright | G |
The jackal and wolf that yelled in the night | G |
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Ye were foully murdered my hapless sons | H |
By the hands of wicked and cruel ones | H |
Ye fell in your fresh and blooming prime | R |
All innocent for your father's crime | R |
He sinned but he paid the price of his guilt | S |
When his blood by a nameless hand was spilt | S |
When he strove with the heathen host in vain | N |
And fell with the flower of his people slain | N |
And the sceptre his children's hands should sway | A |
From his injured lineage passed away | A |
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But I hoped that the cottage roof would be | T |
A safe retreat for my sons and me | T |
And that while they ripened to manhood fast | U |
They should wean my thoughts from the woes of the past | U |
And my bosom swelled with a mother's pride | J |
As they stood in their beauty and strength by my side | J |
Tall like their sire with the princely grace | H |
Of his stately form and the bloom of his face | H |
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Oh what an hour for a mother's heart | V |
When the pitiless ruffians tore us apart | V |
When I clasped their knees and wept and prayed | W |
And struggled and shrieked to Heaven for aid | W |
And clung to my sons with desperate strength | X |
Till the murderers loosed my hold at length | X |
And bore me breathless and faint aside | J |
In their iron arms while my children died | J |
They died and the mother that gave them birth | Y |
Is forbid to cover their bones with earth | Y |
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The barley harvest was nodding white | G |
When my children died on the rocky height | G |
And the reapers were singing on hill and plain | N |
When I came to my task of sorrow and pain | N |
But now the season of rain is nigh | O |
The sun is dim in the thickening sky | O |
And the clouds in sullen darkness rest | Z |
Where he hides his light at the doors of the west | Z |
I hear the howl of the wind that brings | H |
The long drear storm on its heavy wings | H |
But the howling wind and the driving rain | N |
Will beat on my houseless head in vain | N |
I shall stay from my murdered sons to scare | M |
The beasts of the desert and fowls of air | M |
William Cullen Bryant
(1)
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