Works

I sing the birth was born tonight,
The Author both of life and light;
The angels so did sound it,
And like the ravished shepherds said,
Who saw the light, and were afraid,...

And must I sing? what subject shall I chuse?
Or whose great name in Poets heaven use?
For the more countenance to my active Muse?


Hercules? alas his bones are yet sore,...

Weep with me, all you that read
This little story;
And know, for whom a tear you shed
Death's self is sorry.
'Twas a child that so did thrive
In grace and feature,...

I that have been a lover, and could show it,
Though not in these, in rhymes not wholly dumb,
Since I exscribe your sonnets, am become
A better lover, and much better poet....

It is usual
for people in this country
(out of pretended respect
but rather from an impertinent curiosity)
to desire to see
persons
after they are
dead.
...

Still to be neat, still to be dressed,
As you were going to a feast;
Still to be powdered, still perfumed;
Lady, it is to be presumed,
Though art's hid causes are not found,...

Weep with me, all you that read
This little story;
And know for whom a tear you shed,
Death's self is sorry.
'Twas a child that so did thrive
In grace and feature,...

The trawl of unquiet mind drops astern

Great lucid streamers bar the sky ahead
(bifurcated banners at a tourney)
light alchemizes the brass on the bridge
into sallow gold
now the short northern...

The owl is abroad,the bat and the toad,
And so is the cat-a mountain,
The ant and the mole sit both in a hole,
And frog peeps out o'the fountain;
The dogs they do bay,and the timbrels play,...

I

The faery beam upon you,
The stars to glister on you;
A moon of light
In the noon of night,
Till the fire-drake hath o'ergone you!
The wheel of fortune guide you,...

Have you seen but a bright lily grow
Before rude hands have touched it?
Have you marked but the fall of snow
Before the soil hath smutched it?
Have you felt the wool of beaver,
Or swan's down ever?...

In the ember days of my last free summer,
here I lie, outside myself, watching
the gross body eating a poor curry:
satisfied at what I have done, scared of what
I have to do in my last free winter.

Tonight, grave sir, both my poor house and I
Do equally desire your company;
Not that we think us worthy such a guest,
But that your worth will dignify our feast...

Though I am young, and cannot tell,
Either what love, or death is well,
Yet I have heard, yet both bear darts,
And both do aim at human hearts:
And then again, I have been told...

I now think Love is rather deaf than blind,
For else it could not be
That she,
Whom I adore so much, should so slight me
And cast my love behind;
I'm sure my language to her was as sweet,...

Why do we lie

'Why do we lie,' she questioned, her warm eyes
on the grey Autumn wind and its coursing,
'all afternoon wasted in bed like this?'
'Because we cannot lie all night together.'...

Don Surly, to aspire the glorious name
Of a great man, and to be thought the same,
Makes serious use of all great trade he know.
He speaks to men with a Rhinocerotes' nose,...

Farewell, thou child of my right hand, and joy;
My sin was too much hope of thee, loved boy.
Seven years thou wert lent to me, and I thee pay,
Exacted by thy fate, on the just day.
...

A Child Of Queen Elizabeth's Chapel


Weep with me, all you that read
This little story;
And know, for whom a tear you shed
Death's self is sorry.
'Twas a child that so did thrive...

At court I met it, in clothes brave enough
To be a courtier, and looks grave enough
To seem a statesman: as I near it came,
It made me a great face. I asked the name....