The Brothers Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEBFBGHIJKLMNOPQR SOTUVWXSOYZA2UCB2LC2 CD2E2F2G2H2I2J2K2L2M 2N2O2OP2Q2H2BD2R2S2K 2T2U2V2W2L2RHZX2GY2Z 2BA3HB3C3D3E3K2TF3Y2 G3H3OI3TC3FJ3K3L3B2M 3N3E3EO3P3Q3R3T2PN3F S3B2SRT3BGL3IPJ2S3U3 V3L3L3W3NFT2TOX3C3Q3 FY3TZ3T3A4B4C4D4E4TF 4BD3P3FBJ2OL2J2J2C3G 4H4D4V2EQ3A2I4J2L3B4 J4K4TJ2L4L2J2C3J2U3M 4J2R2J2FJ2H2N4O4B'These Tourists heaven preserve us needs must live | A |
A profitable life some glance along | B |
Rapid and gay as if the earth were air | C |
And they were butterflies to wheel about | D |
Long as the summer lasted some as wise | E |
Perched on the forehead of a jutting crag | B |
Pencil in hand and book upon the knee | F |
Will look and scribble scribble on and look | B |
Until a man might travel twelve stout miles | G |
Or reap an acre of his neighbour's corn | H |
But for that moping Son of Idleness | I |
Why can he tarry 'yonder' In our churchyard | J |
Is neither epitaph nor monument | K |
Tombstone nor name only the turf we tread | L |
And a few natural graves ' | M |
To Jane his wife | N |
Thus spake the homely Priest of Ennerdale | O |
It was a July evening and he sate | P |
Upon the long stone seat beneath the eaves | Q |
Of his old cottage as it chanced that day | R |
Employed in winter's work Upon the stone | S |
His wife sate near him teasing matted wool | O |
While from the twin cards toothed with glittering wire | T |
He fed the spindle of his youngest child | U |
Who in the open air with due accord | V |
Of busy hands and back and forward steps | W |
Her large round wheel was turning Towards the field | X |
In which the Parish Chapel stood alone | S |
Girt round with a bare ring of mossy wall | O |
While half an hour went by the Priest had sent | Y |
Many a long look of wonder and at last | Z |
Risen from his seat beside the snow white ridge | A2 |
Of carded wool which the old man had piled | U |
He laid his implements with gentle care | C |
Each in the other locked and down the path | B2 |
That from his cottage to the church yard led | L |
He took his way impatient to accost | C2 |
The Stranger whom he saw still lingering there | C |
'Twas one well known to him in former days | D2 |
A Shepherd lad who ere his sixteenth year | E2 |
Had left that calling tempted to entrust | F2 |
His expectations to the fickle winds | G2 |
And perilous waters with the mariners | H2 |
A fellow mariner and so had fared | I2 |
Through twenty seasons but he had been reared | J2 |
Among the mountains and he in his heart | K2 |
Was half a shepherd on the stormy seas | L2 |
Oft in the piping shrouds had Leonard heard | M2 |
The tones of waterfalls and inland sounds | N2 |
Of caves and trees and when the regular wind | O2 |
Between the tropics filled the steady sail | O |
And blew with the same breath through days and weeks | P2 |
Lengthening invisibly its weary line | Q2 |
Along the cloudless Main he in those hours | H2 |
Of tiresome indolence would often hang | B |
Over the vessel's side and gaze and gaze | D2 |
And while the broad blue wave and sparkling foam | R2 |
Flashed round him images and hues that wrought | S2 |
In union with the employment of his heart | K2 |
He thus by feverish passion overcome | T2 |
Even with the organs of his bodily eye | U2 |
Below him in the bosom of the deep | V2 |
Saw mountains saw the forms of sheep that grazed | W2 |
On verdant hills with dwellings among trees | L2 |
And shepherds clad in the same country grey | R |
Which he himself had worn | H |
And now at last | Z |
From perils manifold with some small wealth | X2 |
Acquired by traffic 'mid the Indian Isles | G |
To his paternal home he is returned | Y2 |
With a determined purpose to resume | Z2 |
The life he had lived there both for the sake | B |
Of many darling pleasures and the love | A3 |
Which to an only brother he has borne | H |
In all his hardships since that happy time | B3 |
When whether it blew foul or fair they two | C3 |
Were brother shepherds on their native hills | D3 |
They were the last of all their race and now | E3 |
When Leonard had approached his home his heart | K2 |
Failed in him and not venturing to enquire | T |
Tidings of one so long and dearly loved | F3 |
He to the solitary churchyard turned | Y2 |
That as he knew in what particular spot | G3 |
His family were laid he thence might learn | H3 |
If still his Brother lived or to the file | O |
Another grave was added He had found | I3 |
Another grave near which a full half hour | T |
He had remained but as he gazed there grew | C3 |
Such a confusion in his memory | F |
That he began to doubt and even to hope | J3 |
That he had seen this heap of turf before | K3 |
That it was not another grave but one | L3 |
He had forgotten He had lost his path | B2 |
As up the vale that afternoon he walked | M3 |
Through fields which once had been well known to him | N3 |
And oh what joy this recollection now | E3 |
Sent to his heart he lifted up his eyes | E |
And looking round imagined that he saw | O3 |
Strange alteration wrought on every side | P3 |
Among the woods and fields and that the rocks | Q3 |
And everlasting hills themselves were changed | R3 |
By this the Priest who down the field had come | T2 |
Unseen by Leonard at the churchyard gate | P |
Stopped short and thence at leisure limb by limb | N3 |
Perused him with a gay complacency | F |
Ay thought the Vicar smiling to himself | S3 |
'Tis one of those who needs must leave the path | B2 |
Of the world's business to go wild alone | S |
His arms have a perpetual holiday | R |
The happy man will creep about the fields | T3 |
Following his fancies by the hour to bring | B |
Tears down his cheek or solitary smiles | G |
Into his face until the setting sun | L3 |
Write fool upon his forehead Planted thus | I |
Beneath a shed that over arched the gate | P |
Of this rude churchyard till the stars appeared | J2 |
The good Man might have communed with himself | S3 |
But that the Stranger who had left the grave | U3 |
Approached he recognised the Priest at once | V3 |
And after greetings interchanged and given | L3 |
By Leonard to the Vicar as to one | L3 |
Unknown to him this dialogue ensued | W3 |
LEONARD You live Sir in these dales a quiet life | N |
Your years make up one peaceful family | F |
And who would grieve and fret if welcome come | T2 |
And welcome gone they are so like each other | T |
They cannot be remembered Scarce a funeral | O |
Comes to this churchyard once in eighteen months | X3 |
And yet some changes must take place among you | C3 |
And you who dwell here even among these rocks | Q3 |
Can trace the finger of mortality | F |
And see that with our threescore years and ten | Y3 |
We are not all that perish I remember | T |
For many years ago I passed this road | Z3 |
There was a foot way all along the fields | T3 |
By the brook side 'tis gone and that dark cleft | A4 |
To me it does not seem to wear the face | B4 |
Which then it had | C4 |
PRIEST Nay Sir for aught I know | D4 |
That chasm is much the same | E4 |
LEONARD But surely yonder | T |
PRIEST Ay there indeed your memory is a friend | F4 |
That does not play you false On that tall pike | B |
It is the loneliest place of all these hills | D3 |
There were two springs which bubbled side by side | P3 |
As if they had been made that they might be | F |
Companions for each other the huge crag | B |
Was rent with lightning one hath disappeared | J2 |
The other left behind is flowing still | O |
For accidents and changes such as these | L2 |
We want not store of them a waterspout | J2 |
Will bring down half a mountain what a feast | J2 |
For folks that wander up and down like you | C3 |
To see an acre's breadth of that wide cliff | G4 |
One roaring cataract a sharp May storm | H4 |
Will come with loads of January snow | D4 |
And in one night send twenty score of sheep | V2 |
To feed the ravens or a shepherd dies | E |
By some untoward death among the rocks | Q3 |
The ice breaks up and sweeps away a bridge | A2 |
A wood is felled and then for our own homes | I4 |
A child is born or christened a field ploughed | J2 |
A daughter sent to service a web spun | L3 |
The old house clock is decked with a new face | B4 |
And hence so far from wanting facts or dates | J4 |
To chronicle the time we all have here | K4 |
A pair of diaries one serving Sir | T |
For the whole dale and one for each fireside | J2 |
Yours was a stranger's judgment for historians | L4 |
Commend me to these valleys | L2 |
LEONARD Yet your Churchyard | J2 |
Seems if such freedom may be used with you | C3 |
To say that you are heedless of the past | J2 |
An orphan could not find his mother's grave | U3 |
Here's neither head nor foot stone plate of brass | M4 |
Cross bones nor skull type of our earthly state | J2 |
Nor emblem of our hopes the dead man's home | R2 |
Is but a fellow to that pasture field | J2 |
PRIEST Why there Sir is a thought that's new to me | F |
The stone cutters 'tis true might beg their bread | J2 |
If every English churchyard were like ours | H2 |
Yet your conclusion wanders from the truth | N4 |
We have no need of names and epitaphs | O4 |
We talk | B |
William Wordsworth
(7)
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