Works

Sudds launders bands in piss, and starches them
Both with her husband's and her own tough fleam.

Tap, better known than trusted, as we hear,
Sold his old mother's spectacles for beer:
And not unlikely; rather too than fail,
He'll sell her eyes, and nose, for beer and ale.

Teage has told lies so long that when Teage tells
Truth, yet Teage's truths are untruths, nothing else.

Tears, though they're here below the sinner's brine,
Above, they are the Angels' spiced wine.

Never was day so over-sick with showers
But that it had some intermitting hours;
Never was night so tedious but it knew
The last watch out, and saw the dawning too;
Never was dungeon so obscurely deep...

Why do not all fresh maids appear
To work love's sampler only here,
Where spring-time smiles throughout the year?
Are not here rosebuds, pinks, all flowers
Nature begets by th' sun and showers,...

I ask'd thee oft what poets thou hast read,
And lik'st the best? Still thou repli'st, The dead.
I shall, ere long, with green turfs cover'd be;
Then sure thou'lt like, or thou wilt envy, me.

This stone can tell the story of my life,
What was my birth, to whom I was a wife:
In teeming years, how soon my sun was set.
Where now I rest, these may be known by jet....

One of the five straight branches of my hand
Is lop'd already, and the rest but stand
Expecting when to fall, which soon will be;
First dies the leaf, the bough next, next the tree.

I have lost, and lately, these
Many dainty mistresses:
Stately Julia, prime of all;
Sapho next, a principal:
Smooth Anthea, for a skin
White, and heaven-like crystalline:...

What wisdom, learning, wit or worth
Youth or sweet nature could bring forth
Rests here with him who was the fame,
The volume of himself and name.
If, reader, then, thou wilt draw near...

Have ye beheld (with much delight)
A red rose peeping through a white?
Or else a cherry (double graced)
Within a lily? Centre placed?
Or ever marked the pretty beam...

Thrice happy roses, so much grac'd to have
Within the bosom of my love your grave.
Die when ye will, your sepulchre is known,
Your grave her bosom is, the lawn the stone.

I ask'd thee oft what poets thou hast read,
And lik'st the best. Still thou reply'st: The dead.
I shall, ere long, with green turfs cover'd be;
Then sure thou'lt like or thou wilt envy me.

O times most bad,
Without the scope
Of hope
Of better to be had!

Where shall I go,
Or whither run
To shun
This public overthrow?

No places are,
This I am sure,...

Time was upon
The wing, to fly away;
And I call'd on
Him but awhile to stay;
But he'd be gone,
For aught that I could say.

He held out then
A writing, as he went,
And ask'd me, when...

The eggs of pheasants wry-nosed Tooly sells,
But ne'er so much as licks the speckled shells:
Only, if one prove addled, that he eats
With superstition, as the cream of meats....

Trap of a player turn'd a priest now is:
Behold a sudden metamorphosis.
If tithe-pigs fail, then will he shift the scene,
And from a priest turn player once again.

Tom shifts the trenchers; yet he never can
Endure that lukewarm name of serving-man:
Serve or not serve, let Tom do what he can,
He is a serving, who's a trencher-man.

Trigg having turn'd his suit, he struts in state,
And tells the world he's now regenerate.