<P> Browning here employs an unusual structure of rhyming couplets in which long trochaic lines are paired with short lines of three syllables . This may be related to the theme of the poem , a comparison between love and material glory . The speaker , overlooking a pasture where sheep graze , recalls that once a great ancient city , his country 's capital , stood there . After spending four stanzas describing the beauty and grandeur of the ancient city , the speaker says that `` a girl with eager eyes and yellow hair / Waits me there '' , and that `` she looks now , breathless , dumb / Till I come . '' The speaker , after musing further on the glory of the city and thinking of how he will greet his lover , closes by rejecting the majesty of the old capital and preferring instead his love : </P>
what type of poem is love among the ruins
rhyming couplets in which long trochaic lines are paired with short lines of three syllables