Blind Old Milton Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABABCBCDCDEDEFEFGFHI G IJIJKJKLKLMLMNMNONOP OQRPROROAOASA STSTOTOUOVWUWXWXOYOF OFZKZOZOOOOYOYAYAA2A A2OB2OC2O C2D2C2D2E2D2E2F2E2F2 KF2FUFUHUHC2H C2G2C2G2OH2OI2OI2J2I 2K2L2K2L2M2L2ED2M2D2 A2D2A2FA2KOFOUON2ON2 OO2OO2A2O2 A2P2A2Q2OP2OOO OOOOR2OS2OAOEOEPlace me once more my daughter where the sun | A |
May shine upon my old and time worn head | B |
For the last time perchance My race is run | A |
And soon amidst the ever silent dead | B |
I must repose it may be half forgot | C |
Yes I have broke the hard and bitter bread | B |
For many a year and with those who trembled not | C |
To buckle on their armor for the fight | D |
And set themselves against the tyrant's lot | C |
And I have never bowed me to his might | D |
Nor knelt before him for I bear within | E |
My heart the sternest consciousness of right | D |
And that perpetual hate of gilded sin | E |
Which made me what I am and though the stain | F |
Of poverty be on me yet I win | E |
More honor by it than the blinded train | F |
Who hug their willing servitude and bow | G |
Unto the weakest and the most profane | F |
Therefore with unencumbered soul I go | H |
Before the footstool of my Maker where | I |
I hope to stand as undebased as now | G |
- | |
Child is the sun abroad I feel my hair | I |
Borne up and wafted by the gentle wind | J |
I feel the odors that perfume the air | I |
And hear the rustling of the leaves behind | J |
Within my heart I picture them and then | K |
I almost can forget that I am blind | J |
And old and hated by my fellow men | K |
Yet would I fain once more behold the grace | L |
Of nature ere I die and gaze again | K |
Upon her living and rejoicing face | L |
Fain would I see thy countenance my child | M |
My comforter I feel thy dear embrace | L |
I hear thy voice so musical and mild | M |
The patient sole interpreter by whom | N |
So many years of sadness are beguiled | M |
For it hath made my small and scanty room | N |
Peopled with glowing visions of the past | O |
But I will calmly bend me to my doom | N |
And wait the hour which is approaching fast | O |
When triple light shall stream upon mine eyes | P |
And heaven itself be opened up at last | O |
To him who dared foretell its mysteries | Q |
I have had visions in this drear eclipse | R |
Of outward consciousness and clomb the skies | P |
Striving to utter with my earthly lips | R |
What the diviner soul had half divined | O |
Even as the Saint in his Apocalypse | R |
Who saw the inmost glory where enshrined | O |
Sat He who fashioned glory This hath driven | A |
All outward strife and tumult from my mind | O |
And humbled me until I have forgiven | A |
My bitter enemies and only seek | S |
To find the straight and narrow path to heaven | A |
- | |
Yet I am weak oh how entirely weak | S |
For one who may not love nor suffer more | T |
Sometimes unbidden tears will wet my cheek | S |
And my heart bound as keenly as of yore | T |
Responsive to a voice now hushed to rest | O |
Which made the beautiful Italian shore | T |
In all its pomp of summer vineyards drest | O |
And Eden and a Paradise to me | U |
Do the sweet breezes from the balmy west | O |
Still murmur through thy groves Parthenope | V |
In search of odors from the orange bowers | W |
Still on thy slopes of verdure does the bee | U |
Cull her rare honey from the virgin flowers | W |
And Philomel her plaintive chaunt prolong | X |
'Neath skies more calm and more serene than ours | W |
Making the summer one perpetual song | X |
Art thou the same as when in manhood's pride | O |
I walked in joy thy grassy meads among | Y |
With that fair youthful vision by my side | O |
In whose bright eyes I looked and not in vain | F |
O my ador d angel O my bride | O |
Despite of years and woe and want and pain | F |
My soul yearns back towards thee and I seem | Z |
To wander with thee hand in hand again | K |
By the bright margins of that flowing stream | Z |
I hear again thy voice more silver sweet | O |
Than fancied music floating in a dream | Z |
Possess my being from afar I greet | O |
The waving of thy garments in the glade | O |
And the light rustling of thy fairy feet | O |
What time as one half eager half afraid | O |
Love's burning secret faltered on my tongue | Y |
And tremulous looks and broken words betrayed | O |
The secret of the heart from whence they sprung | Y |
Ah me the earth that rendered thee to heaven | A |
Gave up an angel beautiful and young | Y |
Spotless and pure as snow when freshly driven | A |
A bright Aurora for the starry sphere | A2 |
Where all is love and even life forgiven | A |
Bride of immortal beauty ever dear | A2 |
Dost thou await me in thy blest abode | O |
While I Tithonus like must linger here | B2 |
And count each step along the rugged road | O |
A phantom tottering to a long made grave | C2 |
And eager to lay down my weary load | O |
- | |
I who was fancy's lord am fancy's slave | C2 |
Like the low murmurs of the Indian shell | D2 |
Ta'en from its coral bed beneath the wave | C2 |
Which unforgetful of the ocean's swell | D2 |
Retains within its mystic urn the hum | E2 |
Heard in the sea grots where Nereids dwell | D2 |
Old thoughts still haunt me unawares they come | E2 |
Between me and my rest nor can I make | F2 |
Those aged visitors of sorrow dumb | E2 |
Oh yet awhile my feeble soul awake | F2 |
Nor wander back with sullen steps again | K |
For neither pleasant pastime canst thou take | F2 |
In such a journey nor endure the pain | F |
The phantoms of the past are dead for thee | U |
So let them ever uninvoked remain | F |
And be thou calm till death shall set thee free | U |
Thy flowers of hope expanded long ago | H |
Long since their blossoms withered on the tree | U |
No second spring can come to make them blow | H |
But in the silent winter of the grave | C2 |
They lie with blighted love and buried woe | H |
- | |
I did not waste the gifts which nature gave | C2 |
Nor slothful lay in the Circean bower | G2 |
Nor did I yield myself the willing slave | C2 |
Of lust for pride for riches or for power | G2 |
No in my heart a nobler spirit dwelt | O |
For constant was my faith in manhood's dower | H2 |
Man made in God's own image and I felt | O |
How of our own accord we courted shame | I2 |
Until to idols like ourselves we knelt | O |
And so renounced the great and glorious claim | I2 |
Of freedom our immortal heritage | J2 |
I saw how bigotry with spiteful aim | I2 |
Smote at the searching eyesight of the sage | K2 |
How Error stole behind the steps of Truth | L2 |
And cast delusion on the sacred page | K2 |
So as a champion even in early youth | L2 |
I waged by battle with a purpose keen | M2 |
Nor feared the hand of terror nor the tooth | L2 |
Of serpent jealousy And I have been | E |
With starry Galileo in his cell | D2 |
That wise magician with the brow serene | M2 |
Who fathomed space and I have seen him tell | D2 |
The wonders of the planetary sphere | A2 |
And trace the ramparts of heaven's citadel | D2 |
On the cold flag stones of his dungeon drear | A2 |
And I have walked with Hampden and with Vane | F |
Names once so gracious to an English ear | A2 |
In days that never may return again | K |
My voice though not the loudest hath been heard | O |
Whenever freedom raised her cry of pain | F |
And the faint effort of the humble bard | O |
Hath roused up thousands from their lethargy | U |
To speak in words of thunder What reward | O |
Was mine or theirs It matters not for I | N2 |
am but a leaf cast on the whirling tide | O |
Without a hope or wish except to die | N2 |
But truth asserted once must still abide | O |
Unquenchable as are those fiery springs | O2 |
Which day and night gush from the mountain side | O |
Perpetual meteors girt with lambent wings | O2 |
Which the wild tempest tosses to and fro | A2 |
But cannot conquer with the force it brings | O2 |
- | |
Yet I who ever felt another's woe | A2 |
More keenly than my own untold distress | P2 |
I who have battled with the common foe | A2 |
And broke for years the bread of bitterness | Q2 |
Who never yet abandoned or betrayed | O |
The trust vouchsafed me nor have ceased to bless | P2 |
Am left alone to wither in the shade | O |
A weak old man deserted by his kind | O |
Whom none will comfort in his age nor aid | O |
- | |
Oh let me not repine A quiet mind | O |
Conscious and upright needs no other stay | O |
Nor can I grieve for what I leave behind | O |
In the rich promise of eternal day | O |
Henceforth to me the world is dead and gone | R2 |
Its thorns unfelt its roses cast away | O |
And the old pilgrim weary and alone | S2 |
Bowed down with travel at his Master's gate | O |
Now sits his task of life long labor done | A |
Thankful for rest although it comes so late | O |
After sore journey through the world of sin | E |
In hope and prayer and wistfulness to wait | O |
Until the door shall ope and let him in | E |
William Edmondstoune Aytoun
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