St. Michael's Mount Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: A BBCCDDEEFFGGHHBBIIJJ KKLLMNOOPPQQRRSSTTLL UUVVGGWWXXYYZZA2A2B2 B2C2C2TTWWJJEED2D2UU JJE2E2SSF2F2IIG2G2H2 H2A2A2KKFFI2I2JJJ2J2 BBAAEEK2K2IIJJKKL2L2 M2N2O2O2YYBBBP2P2F2F 2Q2Q2R2R2M2N2S2S2T2T 2U2O2BBI2I2KKV2V2BBJ JN2M2W2W2M2N2KKJJX2X 2Y2Z2O2O2FFA3A3LLS2S 2O2O2B3

INSCRIBED TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE LORD SOMERSA
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While summer airs scarce breathe along the tideB
Oft pausing up the mountain's craggy sideB
We climb how beautiful how still how clearC
The scenes that stretch around The rocks that rearC
Their shapes in rich fantastic colours dressedD
The hill tops where the softest shadows restD
The long retiring bay the level sandE
The fading sea line and the furthest landE
That seems as low it lessens from the eyeF
To steal away beneath the cloudless skyF
But yesterday the misty morn was spreadG
In dreariness on the bleak mountain's headG
No glittering prospect from the upland smiledH
The driving squall came dark the sea heaved wildH
And lost and lonely the wayfarer sighedB
Wet with the hoar spray of the flashing tideB
How changed is now the circling scene The deepI
Stirs not the glancing roofs and white towers peepI
Along the margin of the lucid bayJ
The sails descried far in the offing grayJ
Hang motionless and the pale headland's heightK
Is touched as with sweet gleams of fairy lightK
Oh lives there on earth's busy stirring sceneL
Whom Nature's tranquil charms her airs sereneL
Her seas her skies her sunbeams fail to moveM
With stealing tenderness and grateful loveN
Go thankless man to Misery's cave beholdO
Captivity stretched in her dungeon coldO
Or think on those who in yon dreary mineP
Sunk fathoms deep beneath the rolling brineP
From year to year amid the lurid shadeQ
O'er wearied ply their melancholy tradeQ
That thou may'st bless the glorious sun and hailR
Him who with beauty clothed the hill and valeR
Who bent the arch of the high heavens for theeS
And stretched in amplitude the broad blue seaS
Now sunk are all its murmurs and the airT
But moves by fits the bents that here and thereT
Upshoot in casual spots of faded greenL
Here straggling sheep the scanty pasture gleanL
Or on the jutting fragments that impendU
Stray fearlessly and gaze as we ascendU
Mountain no pomp of waving woods hast thouV
That deck with varied shade thy hoary browV
No sunny meadows at thy feet are spreadG
No streamlets sparkle o'er their pebbly bedG
But thou canst boast thy beauties ample viewsW
That catch the rapt eye of the pausing MuseW
Headlands around new lighted sails and seasX
Now glassy smooth now wrinkling to the breezeX
And when the drisly Winter wrapped in sleetY
Goes by and winds and rain thy ramparts beatY
Fancy can see thee standing thus aloofZ
And frowning bleak and bare and tempest proofZ
Look as with awful confidence and braveA2
The howling hurricane the dashing waveA2
More graceful when the storm's dark vapours frownB2
Than when the summer suns in pomp go downB2
And such is he who clad in watchet weedsC2
And boasting little more than nature needsC2
Can wrap him in contentedness and wearT
A port unchanged in seasons rude or fairT
His may be Fancy's sunshine and the MuseW
May deck his visions with her fairest huesW
And he may lift his honest front and sayJ
To the hard storm that rends his locks of grayJ
I heed thee not he unappalled may standE
Beneath the cloud that shades a sinking landE
While heedless of the storm that onward sweepsD2
Mad impious Riot his loud wassail keepsD2
Pre eminent in native worth nor bendU
Though gathering ills on his bare head descendU
And when the wasteful storm sweeps o'er its preyJ
And rends the kingdoms of the world awayJ
He firm as stands the rock's unshaken baseE2
Yet panting for a surer resting placeE2
The human hurricane unmoved can seeS
And say O GOD my refuge is in TheeS
States anchored deep that far their shadow castF2
Rock and are scattered by the ALMIGHTY'S blastF2
As when awakened from his horrid sleepI
In fiery caves a thousand fathoms deepI
The Earthquake's Demon hies aloft he waitsG2
Nigh some high turreted proud city's gatesG2
As listening to the mingled shouts and dinH2
Of the mad crowd that feast or dance withinH2
Mean time sad Nature feels his sway the waveA2
Heaves and low sounds moan through the mountain caveA2
Then all at once is still still as midnightK
When not the lime leaf moves Oh piteous sightK
For now the glittering domes crash from on highF
And hark a strange and lamentable cryF
It ceases and the tide's departing roarI2
Alone is heard upon the desert shoreI2
That as it sweeps with slow huge swell awayJ
Remorseless mutters o'er its buried preyJ
So Ruin hurrieth o'er this shaken ballJ2
He bids his blast go forth and lo doth fallJ2
A Carthage or a Rome Then rolls the tideB
Of deep Forgetfulness whelming the prideB
Of man his shattered and forsaken bowersA
His noiseless cities and his prostrate towersA
Some columns eminent and awful standE
Like Egypt's pillars on the lonely sandE
We read upon their base inscribed by FameK2
A HOMER'S here or here a SHAKESPEARE'S nameK2
Yet think not of the surge that soon may sweepI
Ourselves unnumbered to the oblivious deepI
Yet time has been as mouldering legends sayJ
When all yon western tract and this bright bayJ
Where now the sunshine sleeps and wheeling whiteK
The sea mew circles in fantastic flightK
Was peopled wide but the loud storm hath ravedL2
Where its green top the high wood whispering wavedL2
And many a year the slowly rising floodM2
Raked where the Druids' uncooth altar stoodN2
Thou only aged mountain dost remainO2
Stern monument amidst the deluged plainO2
And fruitless the big waves thy bulwarks beatY
The big waves slow retire and murmur at thy feetY
Thou half encircled by the refluent tideB
As if thy state its utmost rage defiedB
Dost tower above the scene as in thine ancient prideB
Mountain the curious Muse might love to gazeP2
On the dim record of thy early daysP2
Oft fancying that she heard like the low blastF2
The sounds of mighty generations pastF2
Thee the Phoenician as remote he sailedQ2
Along the unknown coast exulting hailedQ2
And when he saw thy rocky point aspireR2
Thought on his native shores of Aradus or TyreR2
Distained with many a ghastly giant's bloodM2
Upon thy height huge Corineus stoodN2
And clashed his shield whilst hid in caves profoundS2
His monstrous foe cowered at the fearful soundS2
Hark to the brazen clarion's pealing swellT2
The shout at intervals the deepening yellT2
Long ages speed away yet now againU2
The noise of battle hurtles on the plainO2
Behold the dark haired warriors down thy sideB
O mountain sternly terrible they strideB
Ev'n now impatient for the promised warI2
They rear their axes huge and shouting cry to ThorI2
The sounds of conflict cease at dead of nightK
A voice is heard Prepare the Druid riteK
And hark the bard upon thy summit ringsV2
The deep chords of his thrilling harp and singsV2
To Night's pale Queen that through the heavens wideB
Amidst her still host list'ning seems to rideB
Slow sinks the cadence of the solemn layJ
And all the sombrous scenery steals awayJ
The shadowy Druid throng the darksome woodN2
And the hoar altar wet with human bloodM2
Marked ye the Angel spectre that appearedW2
By other hands the holy fane is rearedW2
High on the point where gazing o'er the floodM2
Confessed the glittering apparition stoodN2
And now the sailor on his watch of nightK
Sees like a glimmering star the far off lightK
Or homeward bound hears on the twilight bayJ
The slowly chanted vespers die awayJ
These scenes are fled and passed yet still sublimeX2
And wearing graceful the gray tints of TimeX2
Upon the steep rock's craggy eminenceY2
The embattled castle sits surveying thenceZ2
The villages that strew the subject plainO2
And the long winding of the lucid mainO2
Meantime the stranger marks its turrets highF
And muses on the tale of changeful years gone byF
Of this no more lo here our journey endsA3
Wide and more wide the arch of heaven extendsA3
And on this topmost fragment as we leanL
We feel removed from dim earth's distant sceneL
Lift up the hollow trump that on the groundS2
Is cast and let it rolling its long soundS2
Speak to the surge below that we may gainO2
Tidings from those who traverse the wide mainO2
Or tread we now some sB3

William Lisle Bowles



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