Imadea posy while the day ran by:Here will I smell my remnant out, and tieMy life within this band;But Time did beckon to the flowers, and theyBy noon most cunningly did steal away,And withered in my hand.
My hand was next to them, and then my heart;I took, without more thinking, in good partTime’s gentle admonition;Who did so sweetly Death’s sad taste convey,Making my mind to smell my fatal day,Yet sugaring the suspicion.
Farewell, dear flowers; sweetly your time ye spent,Fit while ye lived for smell or ornament,And after death for cures.I follow straight, without complaints or grief,Since if my scent be good, I care not ifIt be as short as yours.
Lord, let the angels praise Thy name:Man is a foolish thing, a foolish thing;Folly and sin play all his game;His house still burns, and yet he still doth sing—Man is but grass,He knows it—‘Fill the glass.’
How canst Thou brook his foolishness?Why, he’ll not lose a cup of drink for Thee:Bid him but temper his excess,Not he: he knows where he can better be—As he will swear—Than to serve Thee in fear.
What strange pollutions doth he wed,And make his own! as if none knew but he.No man shall beat into his headThat Thou within his curtains drawn canst see:‘They are of clothWhere never yet came moth.’
The best of men, turn but Thy handFor one poor minute, stumble at a pin;They would not have their actions scanned,Nor any sorrow tell them that they sin,Though it be small,And measure not the fall.
They quarrel Thee, and would give overThe bargain made to serve Thee; but Thy loveHolds them unto it, and doth coverTheir follies with the wings of Thy mild Dove,Not suffering thoseWho would, to be Thy foes.
My God, man cannot praise Thy name:Thou art all brightness, perfect purity;The sun holds down his head for shame,Dead with eclipses, when we speak of Thee:How shall infectionPresume on Thy perfection?
As dirty hands foul all they touch,And those things most which are most pure and fine,So our clay-hearts, even when we crouchTo sing Thy praises, make them less divine:Yet either thisOr none Thy portion is.
Man cannot serve Thee: let him goAnd serve the swine—there, that is his delight:He doth not like this virtue, no;Give him his dirt to wallow in all night:‘These preachers makeHis head to shoot and ache.’
O foolish man! where are thine eyes?How hast thou lost them in a crowd of cares!Thou pull’st the rug, and wilt not rise,No, not to purchase the whole pack of stars:‘There let them shine;Thou must go sleep or dine.’
The bird that sees a dainty bowerMade in the tree, where she was wont to sit,Wonders and sings, but not His powerWho made the arbour; this exceeds her wit.But man doth knowThe Spring whence all things flow:
And yet, as though he knew it not,His knowledge winks, and lets his humours reign;They make his life a constant blot,And all the blood of God to run in vain.Ah, wretch! what verseCan thy strange ways rehearse?
Indeed, at first man was a treasure,A box of jewels, shop of rarities,A ring whose posy was ‘my pleasure’;He was a garden in a Paradise;Glory and graceDid crown his heart and face.
But sin hath fooled him; now he isA lump of flesh, without a foot or wingTo raise him to a glimpse of bliss;A sick-tossed vessel, dashing on each thing,Nay, his own shelf:My God, I mean myself.
Theglories of our blood and stateAre shadows, not substantial things;There is no armour against fate;Death lays his icy hand on kings:Sceptre and CrownMust tumble down,And in the dust be equal madeWith the poor crooked scythe and spade.
Some men with swords may reap the field,And plant fresh laurels where they kill:But their strong nerves at last must yield;They tame but one another still:Early or lateThey stoop to fate,And must give up their murmuring breathWhen they, pale captives, creep to death.
The garlands wither on your brow;Then boast no more your mighty deeds;Upon Death’s purple altar nowSee where the victor-victim bleeds:Your heads must comeTo the cold tomb;Only the actions of the justSmell sweet, and blossom in their dust.
Weepyou no more, sad fountains;What need you flow so fast?Look how the snowy mountainsHeaven’s sun doth gently waste.But my sun’s heavenly eyesView not your weeping,That now lies sleepingSoftly, now softly liesSleeping.
Sleep is a reconciling,A rest that peace begets;Doth not the sun rise smilingWhen fair at eve he sets?Rest you, then, rest, sad eyes,Melt not in weeping,While she lies sleepingSoftly, now softly liesSleeping.
Thelark now leaves his watery nest,And climbing shakes his dewy wings,He takes your window for the east,And to implore your light, he sings;Awake, awake, the morn will never rise,Till she can dress her beauty at your eyes.
The merchant bows unto the seaman’s star,The ploughman from the sun his season takes;But still the lover wonders what they are,Who look for day before his mistress wakes;Awake, awake, break through your veils of lawn!Then draw your curtains and begin the dawn.
Go, lovely rose!Tell her that wastes her time and me,That now she knows,When I resemble her to thee,How sweet and fair she seems to be.
Tell her that’s youngAnd shuns to have her graces spied,That hadst thou sprungIn deserts, where no men abide,Thou must have uncommended died.
Small is the worthOf beauty from the light retired;Bid her come forth,Suffer herself to be desired,And not blush so to be admired.
Then die! that sheThe common fate of all things rareMay read in thee:How small a part of time they shareThat are so wondrous sweet and fair!
Ihavea mistress, for perfections rareIn every eye, but in my thoughts most fair.Like tapers on the altar shine her eyes;Her breath is the perfume of sacrifice;And wheresoe’er my fancy would begin,Still her perfection lets religion in.We sit and talk, and kiss away the hoursAs chastely as the morning dews kiss flowers.I touch her, like my beads, with devout care,And come unto my courtship as my prayer.
Lookhow the pale Queen of the silent nightDoth cause the ocean to attend upon her,And he, as long as she is in his sight,With his full tide is ready her to honour:
But when the silver waggon of the MoonIs mounted up so high he cannot follow,The sea calls home his crystal waves to moan,And with low ebb doth manifest his sorrow.
So you that are the sovereign of my heart,Have all my joys attending on your will,My joys low ebbing when you do depart,When you return, their tide my heart doth fill.
So as you come, and as you do depart,Joys ebb and flow within my tender heart.
Itwas the winter wildWhile the heaven-born ChildAll meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;Nature in awe to HimHad doffed her gaudy trim,With her great Master so to sympathise:It was no season then for herTo wanton with the sun, her lusty paramour.
Only with speeches fairShe woos the gentle airTo hide her guilty front with innocent snow;And on her naked shame,Pollute with sinful blame,The saintly veil of maiden white to throw;Confounded, that her Maker’s eyesShould look so near upon her foul deformities.
But He, her fears to cease,Sent down the meek-eyed Peace;She, crowned with olive green, came softly slidingDown through the turning sphere,His ready harbinger,With turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing;And waving wide her myrtle wand,She strikes a universal peace through sea and land.
No war, or battle’s soundWas heard the world around:The idle spear and shield were high uphung;The hooked chariot stoodUnstained with hostile blood;The trumpet spake not to the armed throng;And kings sat still with awful eye,As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by.
But peaceful was the nightWherein the Prince of LightHis reign of peace upon the earth began:The winds, with wonder whist,Smoothly the waters kist,Whispering new joys to the mild ocean,Who now hath quite forgot to rave,While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed wave.
The stars, with deep amaze,Stand fixed in steadfast gaze,Bending one way their precious influence;And will not take their flightFor all the morning light,Or Lucifer that often warned them thence;But in their glimmering orbs did glow,Until their Lord Himself bespake, and bid them go.
And though the shady gloomHad given day her room,The sun himself withheld his wonted speed,And hid his head for shame,As his inferior flameThe new-enlightened world no more should need;He saw a greater Sun appearThan his bright throne or burning axletree could bear.
The shepherds on the lawn,Or ere the point of dawn,Sat simply chatting in a rustic row;Full little thought they thanThat the mighty PanWas kindly come to live with them below;Perhaps their loves, or else their sheep,Was all that did their silly thoughts so busy keep.
When such music sweetTheir hearts and ears did greetAs never was by mortal fingers strook—Divinely-warbled voiceAnswering the stringed noise,As all their souls in blissful rapture took;The air, such pleasure loth to lose,With thousand echoes still prolongs each heavenly close.
Nature, that heard such soundBeneath the hollow roundOf Cynthia’s seat the airy region thrilling,Now was almost wonTo think her part was done,And that her reign had here its last fulfilling;She knew such harmony aloneCould hold all Heaven and Earth in happier union.
At last surrounds their sightA globe of circular light,That with long beams the shamefaced night arrayed;The helmed CherubimAnd sworded SeraphimAre seen in glittering ranks with wings displayed,Harping in loud and solemn quire,With unexpressive notes, to Heaven’s new-born Heir.
Such music (as ’tis said)Before was never madeBut when of old the Sons of Morning sung,While the Creator greatHis constellations set,And the well-balanced world on hinges hung;And cast the dark foundations deep,And bid the weltering waves their oozy channel keep.
Ring out, ye crystal spheres!Once bless our human ears,If ye have power to touch our senses so;And let your silver chimeMove in melodious time;And let the bass of heaven’s deep organ blow;And with your ninefold harmonyMake up full consort to the angelic symphony.
For if such holy songEnwrap our fancy long,Time will run back and fetch the age of gold;And speckled VanityWill sicken soon and die,And leprous Sin will melt from earthly mould;And Hell itself will pass away,And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day.
Yea, Truth and Justice thenWill down return to men,Orbed in a rainbow; and, like glories wearing,Mercy will sit betweenThroned in celestial sheen,With radiant feet the tissued clouds down steering;And Heaven, as at some festival,Will open wide the gates of her high palace-hall.
But wisest Fate says No;This must not yet be so;The Babe yet lies in smiling infancyThat on the bitter crossMust redeem our loss;So both Himself and us to glorify:Yet first, to those ychained in sleep,The wakeful trump of doom must thunder through the deep,
With such a horrid clangAs on Mount Sinai rang,While the red fire and smouldering clouds out-brake:The aged Earth aghastWith terror of that blastShall from the surface to the centre shake,When, at the world’s last session,The dreadful Judge in middle air shall spread His throne.
And then at last our blissFull and perfect is,But now begins; for from this happy dayThe old Dragon under ground,In straiter limits bound,Not half so far casts his usurped sway;And, wroth to see his kingdom fail,Swinges the scaly horror of his folded tail.
The Oracles are dumb;No voice or hideous humRuns through the arched roof in words deceiving.Apollo from his shrineCan no more divine,With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving:No nightly trance or breathed spellInspires the pale-eyed priest from the prophetic cell.
The lonely mountains o’erAnd the resounding shoreA voice of weeping heard and loud lament;From haunted spring and daleEdged with poplar pale,The parting Genius is with sighing sent;With flower-inwoven tresses tornThe Nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets mourn.
In consecrated earthAnd on the holy hearthThe Lars and Lemures moan with midnight plaint;In urns, and altars round,A drear and dying soundAffrights the Flamens at their service quaint;And the chill marble seems to sweat,While each peculiar Power forgoes his wonted seat.
Peor and BaalimForsake their temples dim,With that twice-battered god of Palestine;And mooned Ashtaroth,Heaven’s queen and mother both,Now sits not girt with tapers’ holy shine;The Lybic Hammon shrinks his horn:In vain the Tyrian maids their wounded Thammuz mourn.
And sullen Moloch, fled,Hath left in shadows dreadHis burning idol all of blackest hue;In vain with cymbals’ ringThey call the grisly king,In dismal dance about the furnace blue;The brutish gods of Nile as fast,Isis, and Orus, and the dog Anubis, haste.
Nor is Osiris seenIn Memphian grove or green,Trampling the unshowered grass with lowings loud:Nor can he be at restWithin his sacred chest;Nought but profoundest Hell can be his shroud;In vain with timbrelled anthems darkThe sable-stoled sorcerers bear his worshipped ark.
He feels from Juda’s landThe dreaded Infant’s hand;The rays of Bethlehem blind his dusky eyn;Nor all the gods besideLonger dare abide,Not Typhon huge ending in snaky twine:Our Babe, to show His Godhead true,Can in His swaddling bands control the damned crew.
So, when the sun in bed,Curtained with cloudy red,Pillows his chin upon an orient wave,The flocking shadows paleTroop to the infernal jail,Each fettered ghost slips to his several grave;And the yellow-skirted faysFly after the night-steeds, leaving their moon-loved maze.
But see! the Virgin blestHath laid her Babe to rest;Time is, our tedious song should here have ending:Heaven’s youngest-teemed starHath fixed her polished car,Her sleeping Lord with handmaid lamp attending:And all about the courtly stableBright-harnessed Angels sit in order serviceable.
Hence, loathed Melancholy,Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight bornIn Stygian cave forlorn,’Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy!Find out some uncouth cellWhere brooding Darkness spreads his jealous wingsAnd the night-raven sings;There under ebon shades, and low-browed rocksAs ragged as thy locks,In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.
But come, thou goddess fair and free,In heaven yclept Euphrosyne,And by men, heart-easing Mirth,Whom lovely Venus at a birthWith two sister Graces moreTo ivy-crowned Bacchus bore;Or whether (as some sager sing)The frolic wind that breathes the spring,Zephyr, with Aurora playing,As he met her once a-Maying—There on beds of violets blueAnd fresh-blown roses washed in dewFilled her with thee, a daughter fair,So buxom, blithe, and debonair.Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with theeJest, and youthful jollity,Quips, and cranks, and wanton wiles,Nods, and becks, and wreathed smiles,Such as hang on Hebe’s cheek,And love to live in dimple sleek;Sport that wrinkled Care derides,And Laughter holding both his sides:—Come, and trip it as you goOn the light fantastic toe;And in thy right hand lead with theeThe mountain-nymph, sweet Liberty;And if I give thee honour due,Mirth, admit me of thy crew,To live with her, and live with theeIn unreproved pleasures free;To hear the lark begin his flightAnd singing startle the dull nightFrom his watch-tower in the skies,Till the dappled dawn doth rise;Then to come, in spite of sorrow,And at my window bid good-morrowThrough the sweetbriar, or the vine,Or the twisted eglantine:While the cock with lively dinScatters the rear of darkness thin,And to the stack, or the barn-door,Stoutly struts his dames before:Oft listening how the hounds and hornCheerly rouse the slumbering morn,From the side of some hoar hill,Through the high wood echoing shrill:Sometime walking, not unseen,By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green,Right against the eastern gateWhere the great Sun begins his stateRobed in flames and amber light,The clouds in thousand liveries dight;While the ploughman, near at hand,Whistles o’er the furrowed land,And the milkmaid singeth blithe,And the mower whets his scythe,And every shepherd tells his taleUnder the hawthorn in the dale.Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasuresWhilst the landscape round it measures;Russet lawns, and fallows gray,Where the nibbling flocks do stray;Mountains, on whose barren breastThe labouring clouds do often rest;Meadows trim with daisies pied,Shallow brooks, and rivers wide;Towers and battlements it seesBosomed high in tufted trees,Where perhaps some Beauty lies,The cynosure of neighbouring eyes.Hard by, a cottage chimney smokesFrom betwixt two aged oaks,Where Corydon and Thyrsis, met,Are at their savoury dinner setOf herbs, and other country messes,Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses;And then in haste her bower she leaves,With Thestylis to bind the sheaves;Or, if the earlier season lead,To the tanned haycock in the mead.Sometimes with secure delightThe upland hamlets will invite,When the merry bells ring round,And the jocund rebecks soundTo many a youth and many a maid,Dancing in the chequered shade;And young and old come forth to playOn a sunshine holiday,Till the live-long day-light fail:Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,With stories told of many a feat,How Faery Mab the junkets eat:—She was pinched and pulled, she said;And he by Friar’s lantern led;Tells how the grudging Goblin sweatTo earn his cream-bowl duly set,When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,His shadowy flail hath threshed the cornThat ten day-labourers could not end;Then lies him down the lubber fiend,And, stretched out all the chimney’s length,Basks at the fire his hairy strength;And crop-full out of doors he flings,Ere the first cock his matin rings.Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,By whispering winds soon lulled asleep.Towered cities please us thenAnd the busy hum of men,Where throngs of knights and barons bold,In weeds of peace, high triumphs hold,With store of ladies, whose bright eyesRain influence, and judge the prizeOf wit or arms, while both contendTo win her grace, whom all commend.There let Hymen oft appearIn saffron robe, with taper clear,And pomp, and feast, and revelry,With mask, and antique pageantry;Such sights as youthful poets dreamOn summer eves by haunted stream.Then to the well-trod stage anon,If Jonson’s learned sock be on,Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy’s child,Warble his native wood-notes wild.And ever against eating caresLap me in soft Lydian airsMarried to immortal verse,Such as the meeting soul may pierceIn notes, with many a winding boutOf linked sweetness long drawn out,With wanton heed and giddy cunning,The melting voice through mazes running,Untwisting all the chains that tieThe hidden soul of harmony;That Orpheus’ self may heave his headFrom golden slumber, on a bedOf heaped Elysian flowers, and hearSuch strains as would have won the earOf Pluto, to have quite set freeHis half-regained Eurydice.These delights if thou canst give,Mirth, with thee I mean to live.
Hence, vain deluding Joys,The brood of Folly without father bred!How little you besteadOr fill the fixed mind with all your toys!Dwell in some idle brain,And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possessAs thick and numberlessAs the gay motes that people the sunbeams,Or likest hovering dreams,The fickle pensioners of Morpheus’ train.
But hail, thou goddess sage and holy,Hail, divinest Melancholy!Whose saintly visage is too brightTo hit the sense of human sight,And therefore to our weaker viewO’erlaid with black, staid Wisdom’s hue;Black, but such as in esteemPrince Memnon’s sister might beseem,Or that starred Ethiop queen that stroveTo set her beauty’s praise aboveThe sea-nymphs, and their powers offended:Yet thou art higher far descended:Thee bright-haired Vesta, long of yore,To solitary Saturn bore;His daughter she; in Saturn’s reignSuch mixture was not held a stain:Oft in glimmering bowers and gladesHe met her, and in secret shadesOf woody Ida’s inmost grove,While yet there was no fear of Jove.Come, pensive Nun, devout and pure,Sober, steadfast, and demure,All in a robe of darkest grainFlowing with majestic trainAnd sable stole of Cipres lawnOver thy decent shoulders drawn:Come, but keep thy wonted state,With even step and musing gait,And looks commercing with the skies,Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes:There, held in holy passion still,Forget thyself to marble, tillWith a sad leaden downward castThou fix them on the earth as fast:And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet,Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet,And hears the Muses in a ringAye round about Jove’s altar sing:And add to these retired LeisureThat in trim gardens takes his pleasure:—But first and chiefest, with thee bringHim that yon soars on golden wing,Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne,The cherub Contemplation;And the mute Silence hist along,’Less Philomel will deign a songIn her sweetest, saddest plight,Smoothing the rugged brow of Night,While Cynthia checks her dragon yokeGently o’er the accustomed oak.Sweet bird, that shunn’st the noise of folly,Most musical, most melancholy!Thee, chauntress, oft the woods among,I woo to hear thy even-song;And missing thee, I walk unseenOn the dry smooth-shaven green,To behold the wandering MoonRiding near her highest noon,Like one that had been led astrayThrough the heaven’s wide pathless way,And oft, as if her head she bowed,Stooping through a fleecy cloud.Oft on a plat of rising groundI hear the far-off curfew soundOver some wide-watered shore,Swinging slow with sullen roar;Or, if the air will not permit,Some still, removed place will fit,Where glowing embers through the roomTeach light to counterfeit a gloom;Far from all resort of mirth,Save the cricket on the hearth,Or the bellman’s drowsy charmTo bless the doors from nightly harm.Or let my lamp at midnight hourBe seen in some high lonely tower,Where I may oft out-watch the BearWith thrice-great Hermes, or unsphereThe spirit of Plato, to unfoldWhat worlds or what vast regions holdThe immortal mind, that hath forsookHer mansion in this fleshly nook:And of those demons that are foundIn fire, air, flood, or under ground,Whose power hath a true consentWith planet, or with element.Sometime let gorgeous TragedyIn sceptered pall come sweeping by,Presenting Thebes, or Pelops’ line,Or the tale of Troy divine;Or what (though rare) of later ageEnnobled hath the buskined stage.But, O sad Virgin, that thy powerMight raise Musaeus from his bower,Or bid the soul of Orpheus singSuch notes as, warbled to the string,Drew iron tears down Pluto’s cheekAnd made Hell grant what Love did seek!Or call up him that left half-toldThe story of Cambuscan bold,Of Camball, and of Algarsife,And who had Canace to wifeThat owned the virtuous ring and glass;And of the wondrous horse of brassOn which the Tartar king did ride:And if aught else great bards besideIn sage and solemn tunes have sungOf tourneys and of trophies hung,Of forests and enchantments drear,Where more is meant than meets the ear.Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career,Till civil-suited Morn appear,Not tricked and frounced as she was wontWith the Attic Boy to hunt,But kercheft in a comely cloudWhile rocking winds are piping loud,Or ushered with a shower still,When the gust hath blown his fill,Ending on the rustling leavesWith minute drops from off the eaves.And when the sun begins to flingHis flaring beams, me, goddess, bringTo arched walks of twilight groves,And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves,Of pine, or monumental oak,Where the rude axe, with heaved stroke,Was never heard the nymphs to daunt,Or fright them from their hallowed haunt.There in close covert by some brook,Where no profaner eye may look,Hide me from day’s garish eye,While the bee with honeyed thigh,That at her flowery work doth sing,And the waters murmuring,With such consort as they keepEntice the dewy-feathered Sleep;And let some strange mysterious dreamWave at his wings in airy streamOf lively portraiture displayed,Softly on my eyelids laid:And, as I wake, sweet music breatheAbove, about, or underneath,Sent by some Spirit to mortals good,Or the unseen Genius of the wood.But let my due feet never failTo walk the studious cloister’s pale,And love the high-embowed roof,With antique pillars massy proof,And storied windows richly dightCasting a dim religious light.There let the pealing organ blowTo the full-voiced quire belowIn service high and anthems clear,As may with sweetness, through mine ear,Dissolve me into ecstasies,And bring all Heaven before mine eyes.And may at last my weary ageFind out the peaceful hermitage,The hairy gown and mossy cellWhere I may sit and rightly spellOf every star that heaven doth shew,And every herb that sips the dew;Till old experience do attainTo something like prophetic strain.These pleasures, Melancholy, give,And I with thee will choose to live.
Elegy on a Friend drowned in the Irish Channel, 1637
Yetonce more, O ye laurels, and once moreYe myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude,And with forced fingers rudeShatter your leaves before the mellowing year.Bitter constraint and sad occasion dearCompels me to disturb your season due:For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer.Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knewHimself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.He must not float upon his watery bierUnwept, and welter to the parching wind,Without the meed of some melodious tear.
Begin, then, Sisters of the sacred wellThat from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring;Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string.Hence withdenial vain and coy excuse:So may some gentle MuseWith lucky words favour my destined urn;And, as he passes, turnAnd bid fair peace be to my sable shroud.
For we were nursed upon the self-same hill,Fed the same flock by fountain, shade, and rill:Together both, ere the high lawns appearedUnder the opening eyelids of the Morn,We drove a-field, and both together heardWhat time the grey-fly winds her sultry horn,Battening our nocks with the fresh dews of night,Oft till the star that rose at evening brightToward heaven’s descent had sloped his westering wheel.Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute,Tempered to the oaten flute,Rough Satyrs danced, and Fauns with cloven heelFrom the glad sound would not be absent long;And old Damoetas loved to hear our song.
But, oh! the heavy change, now thou art gone,Now thou art gone and never must return!Thee, Shepherd, thee the woods and desert cavesWith wild thyme and the gadding vine o’ergrown,And all their echoes, mourn:The willows and the hazel copses greenShall now no more be seenFanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays.As killing as the canker to the rose,Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze,Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe wearWhen first the white-thorn blows;Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherd’s ear.
Where were ye, Nymphs, when the remorseless deepClosed o’er the head of your loved Lycidas?For neither were ye playing on the steepWhere your old bards, the famous Druids, lie,Nor on the shaggy top of Mona high,Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream:Ay me! I fondly dream—Had ye been there . . . For what could that have done?What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore,The Muse herself, for her enchanting son,Whom universal nature did lament,When by the rout that made the hideous roarHis gory visage down the stream was sent,Down the swift Hebrus to the Lesbian shore?
Alas! what boots it with incessant careTo tend the homely, slighted, shepherd’s trade,And strictly meditate the thankless Muse?Were it not better done, as others use,To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,Or with the tangles of Neaera’s hair?Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise(That last infirmity of noble mind)To scorn delights, and live laborious days;But the fair guerdon when we hope to find,And think to burst out into sudden blaze,Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears,And slits the thin-spun life. ‘But not the praise,’Phoebus replied, and touched my trembling ears;‘Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil,Nor in the glistering foilSet off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies:But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyesAnd perfect witness of all-judging Jove;As he pronounces lastly on each deed,Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed.’
O fountain Arethuse, and thou honoured flood,Smooth-sliding Mincius, crowned with vocal reeds,That strain I heard was of a higher mood.But now my oat proceeds,And listens to the herald of the seaThat came in Neptune’s plea.He asked the waves, and asked the felon winds,What hard mishap hath doomed this gentle swain?And questioned every gust of rugged wingsThat blows from off each beaked promontory.They knew not of his story;And sage Hippotades their answer brings,That not a blast was from his dungeon strayed;The air was calm, and on the level brineSleek Panope with all her sisters played.It was that fatal and perfidious barkBuilt in the eclipse, and rigged with curses dark,That sunk so low that sacred head of thine.
Next Camus, reverend sire, went footing slow,His mantle hairy, and his bonnet sedgeInwrought with figures dim, and on the edgeLike to that sanguine flower inscribed with woe.‘Ah! who hath reft,’ quoth he, ‘my dearest pledge?’Last came, and last did goThe Pilot of the Galilean lake;Two massy keys he bore of metals twain(The golden opes, the iron shuts amain);He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake:‘How well could I have spared for thee, young swain,Enow of such, as for their bellies’ sakeCreep and intrude and climb into the fold!Of other care they little reckoning makeThan how to scramble at the shearers’ feast,And shove away the worthy bidden guest.Blind mouths! that scarce themselves know how to holdA sheep-hook, or have learned aught else the leastThat to the faithful herdman’s art belongs!What recks it them? What need they? They are sped;And when they list, their lean and flashy songsGrate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw;The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed,But, swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw,Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread:Besides what the grim wolf with privy pawDaily devours apace, and nothing said:But that two-handed engine at the doorStands ready to smite once, and smite no more.’
Return, Alpheus; the dread voice is pastThat shrunk thy streams; return, Sicilian Muse,And call the vales, and bid them hither castTheir bells and flowerets of a thousand hues.Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers useOf shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooksOn whose fresh lap the swart star sparely looks;Throw hither all your quaint enamelled eyesThat on the green turf suck the honeyed showersAnd purple all the ground with vernal flowers.Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies,The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine,The white pink, and the pansy freaked with jet,The glowing violet,The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine,With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head,And every flower that sad embroidery wears:Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed,And daffadillies fill their cups with tears,To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies.For so to interpose a little ease,Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise:—Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding seasWash far away, where’er thy bones are hurled,Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides,Where thou perhaps, under the whelming tide,Visitest the bottom of the monstrous world;Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied,Sleep’st by the fable of Bellerus old,Where the great Vision of the guarded mountLooks toward Namancos and Bayona’s hold;Look homeward, Angel, now, and melt with ruth:And, O ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth!
Weep no more, woeful shepherds, weep no more,For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead,Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor:So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed,And yet anon repairs his drooping headAnd tricks his beams, and with new-spangled oreFlames in the forehead of the morning sky:So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted highThrough the dear might of Him that walked the waves;Where, other groves and other streams along,With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves,And hears the unexpressive nuptial songIn the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love.There entertain him all the Saints above,In solemn troops, and sweet societies,That sing, and singing in their glory move,And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes.Now, Lycidas, the shepherds weep no more;Henceforth thou art the Genius of the shore,In thy large recompense, and shalt be goodTo all that wander in that perilous flood.
Thus sang the uncouth swain to the oaks and rills,While the still morn went out with sandals grey;He touched the tender stops of various quills,With eager thought warbling his Doric lay:And now the sun had stretched out all the hills,And now was dropt into the western bay:At last he rose, and twitched his mantle blue:To-morrow to fresh woods, and pastures new.
WhenI consider how my light is spentEre half my days, in this dark world and wide,And that one talent which is death to hideLodged with me useless, though my soul more bentTo serve therewith my Maker, and presentMy true account, lest He returning chide,—Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?I fondly ask:—But Patience, to preventThat murmur, soon replies: God doth not needEither man’s work, or His own gifts; who bestBear His mild yoke, they serve Him best: His stateIs kingly; thousands at His bidding speedAnd post o’er land and ocean without rest:They also serve who only stand and wait.
MethoughtI saw my late espoused saintBrought to me like Alkestis from the grave,Whom Jove’s great son to her glad husband gave,Rescued from death by force, though pale and faint.Mine, as whom washed from spot of child-bed taintPurification in the Old Law did save,And such as yet once more I trust to haveFull sight of her in Heaven without restraint,Came vested all in white, pure as her mind;Her face was veiled, yet to my fancied sightLove, sweetness, goodness in her person shinedSo clear as in no face with more delight.But oh! as to embrace me she inclined,I waked, she fled, and day brought back my night.
Whatneeds my Shakespeare, for his honoured bones,The labour of an age in piled stones?Or that his hallowed reliques should be hidUnder a star-y-pointing pyramid?Dear son of memory, great heir of fame,What need’st thou such weak witness of thy name?Thou in our wonder and astonishmentHast built thyself a live-long monument.For whilst, to shame of slow-endeavouring artThy easy numbers flow, and that each heartHath from the leaves of thy unvalued bookThose Delphic lines with deep impression took,Then thou, our fancy of itself bereaving,Dost make us marble with too much conceiving;And so sepulchered in such pomp dost lie,That kings for such a tomb would wish to die.
Nowthe bright morning star, day’s harbinger,Comes dancing from the East, and leads with herThe flowery May, who from her green lap throwsThe yellow cowslip and the pale primrose.Hail, bounteous May, that dost inspireMirth and youth and young desire!Woods and groves are of thy dressing,Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing.Thus we salute thee with our early song,And welcome thee and wish thee long.
Sabrinafair!Listen, where thou art sitting,Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave,In twisted braids of lilies knittingThe loose train of thine amber-dripping hair,Listen for dear honour’s sake,Goddess of the silver lake,Listen and save!Listen, and appear to us,In name of great Oceanus,By the earth-shaking Neptune’s mace,And Tethys’ grave majestic pace;By hoary Nereus’ wrinkled look,And the Carpathian wizard’s hook;By scaly Triton’s winding shell,And old soothsaying Glaucus’ spell;By Leucothea’s lovely hands,And her son that rules the strands;By Thetis’ tinsel-slippered feet,And the songs of sirens sweet;By dead Parthenope’s dear tomb,And fair Ligea’s golden comb,Wherewith she sits on diamond rocksSleeking her soft alluring locks;By all the nymphs that nightly danceUpon thy streams with wily glance;Rise, rise, and heave thy rosy headFrom thy coral-paven bed,And bridle in thy headlong wave,Till thou our summons answered have.Listen and save!
SweetEcho, sweetest Nymph, that liv’st unseenWithin thine airy shellBy slow Meander’s margent green,And in the violet-embroidered vale,Where the love-lorn nightingaleNightly to thee her sad song mourneth well;Canst thou not tell me of a single pairThat likest thy Narcissus are?O, if thou haveHid them in some flowery cave,Tell me but where,Sweet Queen of Parley, daughter of the Sphere!So mayest thou be translated to the skies,And give resounding grace to all Heaven’s harmonies.
Tothe ocean now I fly,And those happy climes that lieWhere day never shuts his eye,Up in the broad fields of the sky.There I suck the liquid air,All amid the gardens fairOf Hesperus, and his daughters threeThat sing about the golden tree.Along the crisped shades and bowersRevels the spruce and jocund Spring;The Graces and the rosy-bosomed HoursThither all their bounties bring.There eternal Summer dwells,And west winds with musky wingAbout the cedarn alleys flingNard and cassia’s balmy smells.Iris there with humid bowWaters the odorous banks, that blowFlowers of more mingled hueThan her purpled scarf can show,And drenches with Elysian dew(List, mortals, if your ears be true)Beds of hyacinth and roses,Where young Adonis oft reposes,Waxing well of his deep woundIn slumber soft, and on the groundSadly sits the Assyrian queen.But far above, in spangled sheen,Celestial Cupid, her famed son, advanced,Holds his dear Psyche, sweet entranced,After her wandering labours long,Till free consent the gods amongMake her his eternal bride,And from her fair unspotted sideTwo blissful twins are to be born,Youth and Joy; so Jove hath sworn.
But now my task is smoothly done:I can fly or I can runQuickly to the green earth’s end,Where the bowed welkin slow doth bend,And from thence can soar as soonTo the corners of the moon.Mortals that would follow me,Love Virtue; she alone is free,She can teach ye how to climbHigher than the sphery chime;Or if feeble Virtue were,Heaven itself would stoop to her.
Letthem bestow on every airth a limb,Then open all my veins, that I may swimTo thee, my Maker! in that crimson lake.Then place my parboiled head upon a stake—Scatter my ashes—strew them in the air:Lord! since thou know’st where all these atoms are,I’m hopeful thou’lt recover once my dust,And confident thou’lt raise me with the just.
Lo, here a little volume, but great book!A nest of new-born sweets,Whose native pages, ’sdainingTo be thus folded, and complainingOf these ignoble sheets,Affect more comely bands,Fair one, from thy kind hands,And confidently lookTo find the restOf a rich binding in your breast!
It is in one choice handful, heaven; and allHeaven’s royal hosts encamped, thus smallTo prove that true schools use to tell,A thousand angels in one point can dwell.
It is love’s great artillery,Which here contracts itself, and comes to lieClose couched in your white bosom; and from thence,As from a snowy fortress of defence,Against your ghostly foe to take your part,And fortify the hold of your chaste heart.
It is an armoury of light;Let constant use but keep it bright,You’ll find it yieldsTo holy hands and humble heartsMore swords and shieldsThan sin hath snares, or hell hath darts.
Only be sureThe hands be pureThat hold these weapons, and the eyesThose of turtles, chaste, and true,Wakeful, and wise.Here’s a friend shall fight for you;Hold but this book before your heart,Let prayer alone to play his part.
But, O! the heartThat studies this high artMust be a sure housekeeper,And yet no sleeper.Dear soul, be strong;Mercy will come ere long,And bring her bosom full of blessings,Flowers of never-fading graces,To make immortal dressingsFor worthy souls, whose wise embracesStore up themselves for Him who is aloneThe Spouse of virgins, and the Virgin’s Son.
But if the noble Bridegroom when He comesShall find the wandering heart from home,Leaving her chaste abodeTo gad abroad,Amongst the gay mates of the god of fliesTo take her pleasure, and to playAnd keep the Devil’s holy day;To dance in the sunshine of some smiling,But beguilingSpheres of sweet and sugared lies,Some slippery pairOf false, perhaps, as fair,Flattering, but forswearing, eyes;
Doubtless some other heartWill get the startMeanwhile, and, stepping in before,Will take possession of that sacred storeOf hidden sweets, and holy joys,Words which are not heard with ears—These tumultuous shops of noise—Effectual whispers, whose still voiceThe soul itself more feels than hears;
Amorous languishments, luminous trances,Sights which are not seen with eyes,Spiritual and soul-piercing glancesWhose pure and subtle lightning fliesHome to the heart, and sets the house on fireAnd melts it down in sweet desire,Yet does not stayTo ask the window’s leave to pass that way;
Delicious deaths, soft exhalationsOf soul; dear and divine annihilations;A thousand unknown ritesOf joys, and rarefied delights;
A hundred thousand goods, glories, and graces,And many a mystic thing,Which the divine embracesOf the dear Spouse of spirits with them will bringFor which it is no shameThat dull mortality must not know a name.
Of all this storeOf blessings, and ten thousand more,If when He comeHe find the heart from home,Doubtless He will unloadHimself some otherwhere,And pour abroadHis precious sweets,On the fair soul whom first He meets.
O fair! O fortunate! O rich! O dear!O happy, and thrice happy she,Dear silver-breasted dove,Whoe’er she be,Whose early loveWith winged vowsMakes haste to meet her morning Spouse,And close with His immortal kisses!Happy, indeed, who never missesTo improve that precious hour,And every daySeize her sweet prey,All fresh and fragrant as He rises,Dropping, with a balmy shower,A delicious dew of spices.
O, let the blessful heart hold fastHer heavenly armful, she shall tasteAt once ten thousand paradises!She shall have powerTo rifle and deflowerThe rich and roseal spring of those rare sweets,Which with a swelling bosom there she meets;Boundless and infinite, bottomless treasuresOf pure inebriating pleasures;Happy proof she shall discover,What joy, what bliss,How many heavens at once it is,To have a God become her lover!
Satisfaction for Sleep
Whatsuccour can I hope the Muse will send,Whose drowsiness hath wronged the Muse’s friend?What hope, Aurora, to propitiate thee,Unless the Muse sing my apology?O! in that morning of my shame, when ILay folded up in sleep’s captivity;How at the sight didst thou draw back thine eyes,Into thy modest veil! how didst thou riseTwice dyed in thine own blushes, and didst runTo draw the curtains and awake the sun!Who, rousing his illustrious tresses, came,And seeing the loathed object, hid for shameHis head in thy fair bosom, and still hidesMe from his patronage; I pray, he chides;And, pointing to dull Morpheus, bids me takeMy own Apollo, try if I can makeHis Lethe be my Helicon, and seeIf Morpheus have a Muse to wait on me.Hence ’tis my humble fancy finds no wings,No nimble raptures, starts to heaven and bringsEnthusiastic flames, such as can giveMarrow to my plump genius, make it liveDressed in the glorious madness of a muse,Whose feet can walk the milky-way, and chooseHer starry throne; whose holy heats can warmThe grave, and hold up an exalted armTo lift me from my lazy urn, and climbUpon the stooped shoulders of old Time,And trace eternity. But all is dead,All these delicious hopes are buriedIn the deep wrinkles of his angry brow,Where mercy cannot find them; but, O thouBright lady of the morn, pity doth lieSo warm in thy soft breast, it cannot die;Have mercy, then, and when he next doth rise,O, meet the angry god, invade his eyes,And stroke his radiant cheeks; one timely kissWill kill his anger, and revive my bliss.So to the treasure of thy pearly dewThrice will I pay three tears, to show how trueMy grief is; so my wakeful lay shall knockAt the oriental gates, and duly mockThe early lark’s shrill orisons to beAn anthem at the day’s nativity.And the same rosy-fingered hand of thine,That shuts night’s dying eyes, shall open mine.But thou, faint god of sleep, forget that IWas ever known to be thy votary.No more my pillow shall thine altar be,Nor will I offer any more to theeMyself a melting sacrifice; I’m bornAgain a fresh child of the buxom morn,Heir of the sun’s first beams; why threat’st thou so?Why dost thou shake thy leaden sceptre? Go,Bestow thy poppy upon wakeful woe,Sickness and sorrow, whose pale lids ne’er knowThy downy finger dwell upon their eyes;Shut in their tears, shut out their miseries.
Love, brave Virtue’s younger brother,Erst hath made my heart a mother.She consults the anxious spheres,To calculate her young son’s years;She asks if sad or saving powersGave omen to his infant hours;She asks each star that then stood byIf poor Love shall live or die.
Ah, my heart, is that the way?Are these the beams that rule thy day?Thou know’st a face in whose each lookBeauty lays ope Love’s fortune-book,On whose fair revolutions waitThe obsequious motions of Love’s fate.Ah, my heart! her eyes and sheHave taught thee new astrology.Howe’er Love’s native hours were set,Whatever starry synod met,’Tis in the mercy of her eye,If poor Love shall live or die.
If those sharp rays, putting onPoints of death, bid Love be gone;Though the heavens in council satTo crown an uncontrolled fate;Though their best aspects twined uponThe kindest constellation,Cast amorous glances on his birth,And whispered the confederate earthTo pave his paths with all the goodThat warms the bed of youth and blood:—Love has no plea against her eye;Beauty frowns, and Love must die.
But if her milder influence move,And gild the hopes of humble Love;—Though heaven’s inauspicious eyeLay black on Love’s nativity;Though every diamond in Jove’s crownFixed his forehead to a frown;—Her eye a strong appeal can give,Beauty smiles, and Love shall live.
O, if Love shall live, O where,But in her eye, or in her ear,In her breast, or in her breath,Shall I hide poor Love from death?For in the life aught else can give,Love shall die, although he live.
Or, if Love shall die, O where,But in her eye, or in her ear,In her breath, or in her breast,Shall I build his funeral nest?While Love shall thus entombed lie,Love shall live, although he die!
Entitled, ‘The Temple of Sacred Poems,’sent to a Gentlewoman
Knowyou, fair, on what you look?Divinest love lies in this book,Expecting fire from your eyes,To kindle this his sacrifice.When your hands untie these strings,Think you’ve an angel by the wings;One that gladly will be nighTo wait upon each morning sigh,To flutter in the balmy airOf your well perfumed prayer.These white plumes of his he’ll lend you,Which every day to heaven will send you,To take acquaintance of the sphere,And all the smooth-faced kindred there.And though Herbert’s name do oweThese devotions, fairest, knowThat while I lay them on the shrineOf your white hand, they are mine.
Whoe’ershe be,That not impossible SheThat shall command my heart and me:
Where’er she he,Locked up from mortal eyeIn shady leaves of destiny:
Till that ripe birthOf studied Fate stand forth,And teach her fair steps tread our earth:
Till that divineIdea take a shrineOf crystal flesh, through which to shine:
Meet you her, my Wishes,Bespeak her to my blisses,And be ye called, my absent kisses.
I wish her beautyThat owes not all its dutyTo gaudy tire, or glist’ring shoe-tie.
Something more thanTaffata or tissue can,Or rampant feather, or rich fan.
More than the spoilOf shop, or silkworm’s toil,Or a bought blush, or a set smile.
A face that’s bestBy its own beauty drest,And can alone commend the rest.
A cheek where youthAnd blood, with pen of truth,Write what the reader sweetly rueth.
A cheek where growsMore than a morning rose,Which to no box his being owes.
Lips where all dayA lover’s kiss may play,Yet carry nothing thence away.
Looks that oppressTheir richest tires, but dressAnd clothe their simple nakedness.
Eyes that displaceTheir neighbour diamond, and out-faceThat sunshine by their own sweet grace.
Tresses that wearJewels, but to declareHow much themselves more precious are;
Whose native rayCan tame the wanton dayOf gems that in their bright shades play.
Each ruby there,Or pearl that dare appear,Be its own blush, be its own tear.
A well-tamed heart,For whose more noble smartLove may be long choosing a dart.
Eyes that bestowFull quivers on love’s bow,Yet pay less arrows than they owe.
Smiles that can warmThe blood, yet teach a charm,That chastity shall take no harm.
Blushes that binThe burnish of no sin,Nor flames of aught too hot within.
Joys that confess,Virtue their mistress,And have no other head to dress.
Fears fond and slightAs the coy bride’s, when nightFirst does the longing lover right.
Tears quickly fled,And vain, as those are shedFor a dying maidenhead.
Soft silken hours,Open suns, shady bowers;’Bove all, nothing within that lowers.
Days that need borrowNo part of their good-morrowFrom a fore-spent night of sorrow.
Days that in spiteOf darkness, by the lightOf a clear mind, are day all night.
Nights, sweet as they,Made short by lovers’ play,Yet long by the absence of the day.
Life, that dares sendA challenge to his end,And when it comes, say, Welcome, friend!
Sydneian showersOf sweet discourse, whose powersCan crown old winter’s head with flowers.
Whate’er delightCan make day’s forehead bright,Or give down to the wings of night.
In her whole frame,Have Nature all the name,Art and ornament the shame.
Her flattery,Picture and poesy,Her counsel her own virtue be.
I wish her storeOf worth may leave her poorOf wishes; and I wish—no more.
Now, if Time knowsThat Her, whose radiant browsWeave them a garland of my vows;
Her whose just baysMy future hopes can raise,A trophy to her present praise;
Her that dares heWhat these lines wish to see;I seek no further, it is She.
’Tis She, and here,Lo! I unclothe and clearMy wishes’ cloudy character.
May she enjoy itWhose merit dare apply it,But modesty dares still deny it!
Such worth as this isShall fix my flying wishes,And determine them to kisses.
Let her full glory,My fancies, fly before ye;Be ye my fictions:—but her story.