Book Fifth-books Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGHIJKLMDNOPQRS TUVDWXYUZEA2B2C2UKD2 UUE2RPF2G2H2UI2J2UK2 UUE2UUZUL2M2UUN2EUFE 2SUO2C2P2Q2UR2UUS2T2 U2V2UUW2UUUJ2P2FUX2U Y2Z2A3FUWUUB3RC3D3UP E3CF3UP2G3V2C3UUUI2H 3I3UJ3UUUK3UIUL3BM3U UN3UUUCI3U BUMDUUM3UUUC2UN3M3R2 M3O3WC2Y2UP3UM3G CQ3M3UM3R3M3UUM3UUG2 K2J3S3UT3M3M3U3V3WHEN Contemplation like the night calm felt | A |
Through earth and sky spreads widely and sends deep | B |
Into the soul its tranquillising power | C |
Even then I sometimes grieve for thee O Man | D |
Earth's paramount Creature not so much for woes | E |
That thou endurest heavy though that weight be | F |
Cloud like it mounts or touched with light divine | G |
Doth melt away but for those palms achieved | H |
Through length of time by patient exercise | I |
Of study and hard thought there there it is | J |
That sadness finds its fuel Hitherto | K |
In progress through this Verse my mind hath looked | L |
Upon the speaking face of earth and heaven | M |
As her prime teacher intercourse with man | D |
Established by the sovereign Intellect | N |
Who through that bodily image hath diffused | O |
As might appear to the eye of fleeting time | P |
A deathless spirit Thou also man hast wrought | Q |
For commerce of thy nature with herself | R |
Things that aspire to unconquerable life | S |
And yet we feel we cannot choose but feel | T |
That they must perish Tremblings of the heart | U |
It gives to think that our immortal being | V |
No more shall need such garments and yet man | D |
As long as he shall be the child of earth | W |
Might almost 'weep to have' what he may lose | X |
Nor be himself extinguished but survive | Y |
Abject depressed forlorn disconsolate | U |
A thought is with me sometimes and I say | Z |
Should the whole frame of earth by inward throes | E |
Be wrenched or fire come down from far to scorch | A2 |
Her pleasant habitations and dry up | B2 |
Old Ocean in his bed left singed and bare | C2 |
Yet would the living Presence still subsist | U |
Victorious and composure would ensue | K |
And kindlings like the morning presage sure | D2 |
Of day returning and of life revived | U |
But all the meditations of mankind | U |
Yea all the adamantine holds of truth | E2 |
By reason built or passion which itself | R |
Is highest reason in a soul sublime | P |
The consecrated works of Bard and Sage | F2 |
Sensuous or intellectual wrought by men | G2 |
Twin labourers and heirs of the same hopes | H2 |
Where would they be Oh why hath not the Mind | U |
Some element to stamp her image on | I2 |
In nature somewhat nearer to her own | J2 |
Why gifted with such powers to send abroad | U |
Her spirit must it lodge in shrines so frail | K2 |
- | |
One day when from my lips a like complaint | U |
Had fallen in presence of a studious friend | U |
He with a smile made answer that in truth | E2 |
'Twas going far to seek disquietude | U |
But on the front of his reproof confessed | U |
That he himself had oftentimes given way | Z |
To kindred hauntings Whereupon I told | U |
That once in the stillness of a summer's noon | L2 |
While I was seated in a rocky cave | M2 |
By the sea side perusing so it chanced | U |
The famous history of the errant knight | U |
Recorded by Cervantes these same thoughts | N2 |
Beset me and to height unusual rose | E |
While listlessly I sate and having closed | U |
The book had turned my eyes toward the wide sea | F |
On poetry and geometric truth | E2 |
And their high privilege of lasting life | S |
From all internal injury exempt | U |
I mused upon these chiefly and at length | O2 |
My senses yielding to the sultry air | C2 |
Sleep seized me and I passed into a dream | P2 |
I saw before me stretched a boundless plain | Q2 |
Of sandy wilderness all black and void | U |
And as I looked around distress and fear | R2 |
Came creeping over me when at my side | U |
Close at my side an uncouth shape appeared | U |
Upon a dromedary mounted high | S2 |
He seemed an Arab of the Bedouin tribes | T2 |
A lance he bore and underneath one arm | U2 |
A stone and in the opposite hand a shell | V2 |
Of a surpassing brightness At the sight | U |
Much I rejoiced not doubting but a guide | U |
Was present one who with unerring skill | W2 |
Would through the desert lead me and while yet | U |
I looked and looked self questioned what this freight | U |
Which the new comer carried through the waste | U |
Could mean the Arab told me that the stone | J2 |
To give it in the language of the dream | P2 |
Was 'Euclid's Elements ' and 'This ' said he | F |
'Is something of more worth ' and at the word | U |
Stretched forth the shell so beautiful in shape | X2 |
In colour so resplendent with command | U |
That I should hold it to my ear I did so | Y2 |
And heard that instant in an unknown tongue | Z2 |
Which yet I understood articulate sounds | A3 |
A loud prophetic blast of harmony | F |
An Ode in passion uttered which foretold | U |
Destruction to the children of the earth | W |
By deluge now at hand No sooner ceased | U |
The song than the Arab with calm look declared | U |
That all would come to pass of which the voice | B3 |
Had given forewarning and that he himself | R |
Was going then to bury those two books | C3 |
The one that held acquaintance with the stars | D3 |
And wedded soul to soul in purest bond | U |
Of reason undisturbed by space or time | P |
The other that was a god yea many gods | E3 |
Had voices more than all the winds with power | C |
To exhilarate the spirit and to soothe | F3 |
Through every clime the heart of human kind | U |
While this was uttering strange as it may seem | P2 |
I wondered not although I plainly saw | G3 |
The one to be a stone the other a shell | V2 |
Nor doubted once but that they both were books | C3 |
Having a perfect faith in all that passed | U |
Far stronger now grew the desire I felt | U |
To cleave unto this man but when I prayed | U |
To share his enterprise he hurried on | I2 |
Reckless of me I followed not unseen | H3 |
For oftentimes he cast a backward look | I3 |
Grasping his twofold treasure Lance in rest | U |
He rode I keeping pace with him and now | J3 |
He to my fancy had become the knight | U |
Whose tale Cervantes tells yet not the knight | U |
But was an Arab of the desert too | U |
Of these was neither and was both at once | K3 |
His countenance meanwhile grew more disturbed | U |
And looking backwards when he looked mine eyes | I |
Saw over half the wilderness diffused | U |
A bed of glittering light I asked the cause | L3 |
'It is ' said he 'the waters of the deep | B |
Gathering upon us ' quickening then the pace | M3 |
Of the unwieldy creature he bestrode | U |
He left me I called after him aloud | U |
He heeded not but with his twofold charge | N3 |
Still in his grasp before me full in view | U |
Went hurrying o'er the illimitable waste | U |
With the fleet waters of a drowning world | U |
In chase of him whereat I waked in terror | C |
And saw the sea before me and the book | I3 |
In which I had been reading at my side | U |
- | |
Full often taking from the world of sleep | B |
This Arab phantom which I thus beheld | U |
This semi Quixote I to him have given | M |
A substance fancied him a living man | D |
A gentle dweller in the desert crazed | U |
By love and feeling and internal thought | U |
Protracted among endless solitudes | M3 |
Have shaped him wandering upon this quest | U |
Nor have I pitied him but rather felt | U |
Reverence was due to a being thus employed | U |
And thought that in the blind and awful lair | C2 |
Of such a madness reason did lie couched | U |
Enow there are on earth to take in charge | N3 |
Their wives their children and their virgin loves | M3 |
Or whatsoever else the heart holds dear | R2 |
Enow to stir for these yea will I say | M3 |
Contemplating in soberness the approach | O3 |
Of an event so dire by signs in earth | W |
Or heaven made manifest that I could share | C2 |
That maniac's fond anxiety and go | Y2 |
Upon like errand Oftentimes at least | U |
Me hath such strong entrancement overcome | P3 |
When I have held a volume in my hand | U |
Poor earthly casket of immortal verse | M3 |
Shakespeare or Milton labourers divine | G |
- | |
Great and benign indeed must be the power | C |
Of living nature which could thus so long | Q3 |
Detain me from the best of other guides | M3 |
And dearest helpers left unthanked unpraised | U |
Even in the time of lisping infancy | M3 |
And later down in prattling childhood even | R3 |
While I was travelling back among those days | M3 |
How could I ever play an ingrate's part | U |
Once more should I have made those bowers resound | U |
By intermingling strains of thankfulness | M3 |
With their own thoughtless melodies at least | U |
It might have well beseemed me to repeat | U |
Some simply fashioned tale to tell again | G2 |
In slender accents of sweet verse some tale | K2 |
That did bewitch me then and soothes me now | J3 |
O Friend O Poet brother of my soul | S3 |
Think not that I could pass along untouched | U |
By these remembrances Yet wherefore speak | T3 |
Why call upon a few weak words to say | M3 |
What is already written in the hearts | M3 |
Of all that breathe what in the path of all | U3 |
Drops daily from the tongue of ev | V3 |
William Wordsworth
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