The Penguin Book of English Verse

by Paul Keegan

  Thy anger comes, and I decline:

  What frost to that? what pole is not the zone,

  Where all things burn,

  When thou dost turn,

  And the least frown of thine is shown?

  And now in age I bud again,

  After so many deaths I live and write;

  I once more smell the dew and rain,

  And relish versing: O my onely light,

  It cannot be

  That I am he

  On whom thy tempests fell all night.

  These are thy wonders, Lord of love,

  To make us see we are but flowers that glide:

  Which when we once can finde and prove,

  Thou hast a garden for us, where to bide.

  Who would be more,

  Swelling through store,

  Forfeit their Paradise by their pride.

  The Answer

  My comforts drop and melt away like snow:

  I shake my head, and all the thoughts and ends,

  Which my fierce youth did bandie, fall and flow

  Like leaves about me: or like summer friends,

  Flyes of estates and sunne-shine. But to all,

  Who think me eager, hot, and undertaking,

  But in my prosecutions slack and small;

  As a young exhalation, newly waking,

  Scorns his first bed of dirt, and means the sky;

  But cooling by the way, grows pursie and slow,

  And setling to a cloud, doth live and die

  In that dark state of tears: to all, that so

  Show me, and set me, I have one reply,

  Which they that know the rest, know more then I.

  A Wreath

  A wreathed garland of deserved praise,

  Of praise deserved, unto thee I give,

  I give to thee, who knowest all my wayes,

  My crooked winding wayes, wherein I live,

  Wherein I die, not live: for life is straight,

  Straight as a line, and ever tends to thee,

  To thee, who art more farre above deceit,

  Then deceit seems above simplicitie.

  Give me simplicitie, that I may live,

  So live and like, that I may know, thy wayes,

  Know them and practise them: then shall I give

  For this poore wreath, give thee a crown of praise.

  Love

  Love bade me welcome: yet my soul drew back,

  Guiltie of dust and sinne.

  But quick-ey’d Love, observing me grow slack

  From my first entrance in,

  Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning,

  If I lack’d any thing.

  A guest, I answer’d, worthy to be here:

  Love said, You shall be he.

  I the unkinde, ungratefull? Ah my deare,

  I cannot look on thee.

  Love took my hand, and smiling did reply,

  Who made the eyes but I?

  Truth Lord, but I have marr’d them: let my shame

  Go where it doth deserve.

  And know you not, sayes Love, who bore the blame?

  My deare, then I will serve.

  You must sit down, sayes Love, and taste my meat:

  So I did sit and eat.

  1635 FRANCIS QUARLES Embleme IV [Canticles 7.10.1 am my Beloved’s, and his desire is towards me.]

  Like to the Artick needle, that doth guide

  The wand’ring shade by his Magnetick pow’r,

  And leaves his silken Gnomon to decide

  The question of the controverted houre;

  First franticks up and down, from side to side,

  And restlesse beats his crystall’d Iv’ry case

  With vain impatience; jets from place to place,

  And seeks the bosome of his frozen bride;

  At length he slacks his motion, and doth rest

  His trembling point at his bright Pole’s beloved brest.

  Ev’n so my soul, being hurried here and there,

  By ev’ry object that presents delight,

  Fain would be settled, but she knowes not where;

  She likes at morning what she loaths at night;

  She bowes to honour; then she lends an eare

  To that sweet swan-like voyce of dying pleasure,

  Then tumbles in the scatter’d heaps of treasure;

  Now flatter’d with false hope; now foyl’d with fear:

  Thus finding all the world’s delights to be

  But empty toyes, good God, she points alone to thee.

  But hath the virtued steel a power to move?

  Or can the untouch’d needle point aright?

  Or can my wandring thoughts forbear to rove,

  Unguided by the virtue of thy spirit?

  O hath my leaden soul the art t’ improve

  Her wasted talent, and unrais’d, aspire

  In this sad moulting-time of her desire?

  Not first belov’d have I the power to love?

  I cannot stirre, but as thou please to move me,

  Nor can my heart return thee love, until thou love me.

  The still Commandresse of the silent night

  Borrows her beams from her bright brother’s eye;

  His fair aspect filles her sharp horns with light;

  If he withdraw, her flames are quench’d and die:

  Even so the beams of thy enlightning spirit

  Infus’d and shot into my dark desire,

  Inflame my thoughts, and fill my soul with fire,

  That I am ravisht with a new delight;

  But if thou shroud thy face, my glory fades,

  And I remain a Nothing, all compos’d of shades.

  Eternall God, O thou that onely art

  The sacred Fountain of eternall light,

  And blessed Loadstone of my better part;

  O thou my heart’s desire, my soul’s delight,

  Reflect upon my soul, and touch my heart,

  And then my heart shall prize no good above thee;

  And then my soul shall know thee; knowing, love thee;

  And then my trembling thoughts shall never start

  From thy commands, or swerve the least degree,

  Or once presume to move, but as they move in thee.

  Epigram

  My soul, thy love is dear: ’Twas thought a good

  And easie pen’worth of thy Saviour’s bloud:

  But be not proud; All matters rightly scann’d,

  ’Twas over-bought: ’Twas sold at second hand.

  1637 EDWARD LORD HERBERT OF CHERBURY Epitaph on Sir Philip Sidney Lying in St Paul’s without a Monument, to be Fastned upon the Church Door

  Reader,

  Within this Church Sir Philip Sidney lies,

  Nor is it fit that I should more acquaint,

  Lest superstition rise,

  And men adore,

  Souldiers, their Martyr; Lovers, their Saint.

  ROBERT SEMPILL OF BELTREES The Life and Death of Habbie Simson, the Piper of Kilbarchan

  Kilbarchan now may say alas!

  For she hath lost her game and grace,

  Both Trixie and The Maiden Trace;

  But what remead?

  5

  For no man can supply his place:

  Hab Simson’s dead.

  Now who shall play The Day it Dawis,

  Or Hunt’s Up, when the cock he craws?

  Or who can for our kirk-town cause

  10

  Stand us in stead?

  On bagpipes now nobody blaws

  Sen Habbie’s dead.

  Or wha will cause our shearers shear?

  Wha will bend up the brags of weir,

  15

  Bring in the bells, or good play-meir

  In time of need?

  Hab Simson cou’d, what needs you speir?

  But now he’s dead.

  So kindly to his neighbours neast

  20

  At Beltan and St Barchan’s feast
/>   He blew, and then held up his breast,

  As he were weid:

  But now we need not him arrest,

  For Habbie’s dead.

  25

  At fairs he play’d before the spear-men

  All gaily graithed in their gear men:

  Steel bonnets, jacks, and swords so clear then

  Like any bead:

  Now wha shall play before such weir-men

  30

  Sen Habbie’s dead?

  At clark-plays when he wont to come

  His Pipe play’d trimly to the drum;

  Like bikes of bees he gart it bum,

  And tun’d his reed:

  35

  Now all our pipers may sing dumb,

  Sen Habbie’s dead.

  And at horse races many a day,

  Before the black, the brown, the gray,

  He gart his pipe, when he did play,

  40

  Baith skirl and skreed:

  Now all such pastime’s quite away

  Sen Habbie’s dead.

  He counted was a weil’d wight-man,

  And fiercely at football he ran:

  45

  At every game the gree he wan

  For pith and speed.

  The like of Habbie was na than,

  But now he’s dead.

  And than, besides his valiant acts,

  50

  At bridals he won many placks;

  He bobbed ay behind fo’k’s backs

  And shook his head.

  Now we want many merry cracks

  Sen Habbie’s dead.

  55

  He was convoyer of the bride,

  With Kittock hinging at his side;

  About the kirk he thought a pride

  The ring to lead:

  But now we may gae but a guide,

  60

  For Habbie’s dead.

  So well’s he keeped his decorum

  And all the stots of Whip-meg-morum;

  He slew a man, and wae’s me for him,

  And bure the fead!

  65

  But yet the man wan hame before him,

  And was not dead.

  And whan he play’d, the lasses leugh

  To see him teethless, auld, and teugh,

  He wan his pipes besides Barcleugh,

  70

  Withouten dread!

  Which after wan him gear eneugh;

  But now he’s dead.

  Ay when he play’d the gaitlings gedder’d,

  And when he spake, the carl bledder’d,

  75

  On Sabbath days his cap was fedder’d,

  A seemly weid;

  In the kirk-yeard his mare stood tedder’d

  Where he lies dead.

  Alas! for him my heart is saur,

  80

  For of his spring I gat a skair,

  At every play, race, feast, and fair,

  But guile or greed;

  We need not look for pyping mair,

  Sen Habbie’s dead.

  THOMAS JORDAN A Double Acrostich on Mrs Svsanna Blvnt

  Sweete

  Soule of goodnesse, in whose Saintlike brest

  Vertue

  Vowe’s dwelling, to make beauty blest;

  Sure

  Sighing Cytherea sits, your eyes

  Are

  Altars whereon shee might sacrifice;

  Now

  None will of the Paphean order be;

  Natur’s

  New worke transcends a deity;

  Arabia’s

  Aromatticks court your scent;

  Bright

  Beauty makes your gazers eloquent,

  Let

  Little Cupid his lost eyes obtaine

  (Vayl’d)

  Viewing you would strike him blinde againe;

  Nay

  Never thinke I flatter, if you be

  Thus

  To none else (by love) you are to me.

  JOHN MILTON from A Mask Presented at Ludlow-Castle, 1634 [Comus]

  Comus enters with a Charming Rod in one hand, his Glass in the other, with him a rout of Monsters headed like sundry sorts of wilde Beasts, but otherwise like Men and Women, their Apparel glistring, they com in making a riotous and unruly noise, with Torches in their hands.

  COMUS

  The Star that bids the Shepherd fold,

  Now the top of Heav’n doth hold,

  And the gilded Car of Day,

  His glowing Axle doth allay

  In the steep Atlantick stream,

  And the slope Sun his upward beam

  Shoots against the dusky Pole,

  Pacing toward the other gole

  Of his Chamber in the East.

  Mean while welcom Joy, and Feast,

  Midnight shout, and revelry,

  Tipsie dance, and Jollity.

  Braid your Locks with rosie Twine

  Dropping odours, dropping Wine.

  Rigor now is gon to bed,

  And Advice with scrupulous head,

  Strict Age, and sowre Severity,

  With their grave Saws in slumber ly.

  We that are of purer fire

  Imitate the Starry Quire,

  Who in their nightly watchfull Sphears,

  Lead in swift round the Months and Years.

  The Sounds, and Seas with all their finny drove

  Now to the Moon in wavering Morrice move,

  And on the Tawny Sands and Shelves,

  Trip the pert Fairies and the dapper Elves;

  By dimpled Brook, and Fountain brim,

  The Wood-Nymphs deckt with Daisies trim,

  Their merry wakes and pastimes keep:

  What hath night to do with sleep?

  Night hath better sweets to prove,

  Venus now wakes, and wak’ns Love.

  Com let us our rights begin,

  ’Tis onely day-light that makes Sin

  Which these dun shades will ne’re report.

  Hail Goddesse of Nocturnal sport

  Dark vaild Cotytto, t’whom the secret flame

  Of mid-night Torches burns; mysterious Dame

  That ne’re art call’d, but when the Dragon woom

  Of Stygian darknes spets her thickest gloom,

  And makes one blot of all the ayr,

  Stay thy cloudy Ebon chair,

  Wherin thou rid’st with Hecat’, and befriend

  Us thy vow’d Priests, till utmost end