My Dream Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCC DDEE FFGG CCHH IIJJ KLFF MMNN OOFF PPII QQRR CCST MMUU NNVV WWXX YYZZ A2A2B2B2 C2C2PP D2D2E2E2 IIF2F2 G2G2A2A2 G2G2H2I2 J2J2II KLK2K2The other night from cares exempt | A |
I slept and what d'you think I dreamt | B |
I dreamt that somehow I had come | C |
To dwell in Topsy Turveydom | C |
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Where vice is virtue virtue vice | D |
Where nice is nasty nasty nice | D |
Where right is wrong and wrong is right | E |
Where white is black and black is white | E |
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Where babies much to their surprise | F |
Are born astonishingly wise | F |
With every Science on their lips | G |
And Art at all their finger tips | G |
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For as their nurses dandle them | C |
They crow binomial theorem | C |
With views it seems absurd to us | H |
On differential calculus | H |
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But though a babe as I have said | I |
Is born with learning in his head | I |
He must forget it if he can | J |
Before he calls himself a man | J |
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For that which we call folly here | K |
Is wisdom in that favoured sphere | L |
The wisdom we so highly prize | F |
Is blatant folly in their eyes | F |
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A boy if he would push his way | M |
Must learn some nonsense every day | M |
And cut to carry out this view | N |
His wisdom teeth and wisdom too | N |
- | |
Historians burn their midnight oils | O |
Intent on giant killers' toils | O |
And sages close their aged eyes | F |
To other sages' lullabies | F |
- | |
Our magistrates in duty bound | P |
Commit all robbers who are found | P |
But there the Beaks so people said | I |
Commit all robberies instead | I |
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Our Judges pure and wise in tone | Q |
Know crime from theory alone | Q |
And glean the motives of a thief | R |
From books and popular belief | R |
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But there a Judge who wants to prime | C |
His mind with true ideas of crime | C |
Derives them from the common sense | S |
Of practical experience | T |
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Policemen march all folks away | M |
Who practise virtue every day | M |
Of course I mean to say you know | U |
What we call virtue here below | U |
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For only scoundrels dare to do | N |
What we consider just and true | N |
And only good men do in fact | V |
What we should think a dirty act | V |
- | |
But strangest of these social twirls | W |
The girls are boys the boys are girls | W |
The men are women too but then | X |
Per contra women all are men | X |
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To one who to tradition clings | Y |
This seems an awkward state of things | Y |
But if to think it out you try | Z |
It doesn't really signify | Z |
- | |
With them as surely as can be | A2 |
A sailor should be sick at sea | A2 |
And not a passenger may sail | B2 |
Who cannot smoke right through a gale | B2 |
- | |
A soldier save by rarest luck | C2 |
Is always shot for showing pluck | C2 |
That is if others can be found | P |
With pluck enough to fire a round | P |
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How strange I said to one I saw | D2 |
You quite upset our every law | D2 |
However can you get along | E2 |
So systematically wrong | E2 |
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Dear me my mad informant said | I |
Have you no eyes within your head | I |
You sneer when you your hat should doff | F2 |
Why we begin where you leave off | F2 |
- | |
Your wisest men are very far | G2 |
Less learned than our babies are | G2 |
I mused awhile and then oh me | A2 |
I framed this brilliant repartee | A2 |
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Although your babes are wiser far | G2 |
Than our most valued sages are | G2 |
Your sages with their toys and cots | H2 |
Are duller than our idiots | I2 |
- | |
But this remark I grieve to state | J2 |
Came just a little bit too late | J2 |
For as I framed it in my head | I |
I woke and found myself in bed | I |
- | |
Still I could wish that 'stead of here | K |
My lot were in that favoured sphere | L |
Where greatest fools bear off the bell | K2 |
I ought to do extremely well | K2 |
William Schwenck Gilbert
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