Delphi Poetry Anthology: The World's Greatest Poems (Delphi Poets Series Book 50) (115 page)
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Authors: Homer,William Shakespeare
Wishes for the Supposed Mistress
Richard Crashaw (1613–1649)
WHOE’ER she be,
That not impossible She
That shall command my heart and me;
Where’er she lie,
Lock’d up from mortal eye
5
In shady leaves of destiny:
Till that ripe birth
Of studied Fate stand forth,
And teach her fair steps tread our earth;
Till that divine
10
Idea take a shrine
Of crystal flesh, through which to shine:
— Meet you her, my Wishes,
Bespeak her to my blisses,
And be ye call’d, my absent kisses.
15
I wish her Beauty
That owes not all its duty
To gaudy tire, or glist’ring shoe-tie:
Something more than
Taffata or tissue can,
20
Or rampant feather, or rich fan.
A Face that’s best
By its own beauty drest,
And can alone commend the rest:
A Face made up
25
Out of no other shop
Than what Nature’s white hand sets ope.
A Cheek, where youth
And blood, with pen of truth,
Write what the reader sweetly ru’th.
30
A Cheek, where grows
More than a morning rose,
Which to no box his being owes.
Lips, where all day
A lover’s kiss may play,
35
Yet carry nothing thence away.
Looks, that oppress
Their richest tires, but dress
And clothe their simplest nakedness.
Eyes, that displace
40
The neighbor diamond, and outface
That sunshine by their own sweet grace.
Tresses, that wear
Jewels but to declare
How much themselves more precious are:
45
Whose native ray
Can tame the wanton day
Of gems that in their bright shades play.
Each ruby there,
Or pearl that dare appear,
50
Be its own blush, be its own tear.
A well-tamed Heart,
For whose more noble smart
Love may be long choosing a dart.
Eyes, that bestow
55
Full quivers on love’s bow,
Yet pay less arrows than they owe.
Smiles, that can warm
The blood, yet teach a charm,
That chastity shall take no harm.
60
Blushes, that bin
The burnish of no sin,
Nor flames of aught too hot within.
Joys, that confess
Virtue their mistress,
65
And have no other head to dress.
Fears, fond and slight
As the coy bride’s, when night
First does the longing lover right.
Days, that need borrow
70
No part of their good morrow
From a fore-spent night of sorrow:
Days, that in spite
Of darkness, by the light
Of a clear mind are day all night.
75
Nights, sweet as they
Made short by lovers’ play,
Yet long by th’ absence of day.
Life, that dares send
A challenge to his end,
80
And when it comes, say, ‘Welcome, friend.’
Sydneian Showers
Of sweet discourse, whose powers
Can crown old Winter’s head with flowers.
Soft silken hours,
85
Open suns, shady bowers;
‘Bove all, nothing within that lowers.
Whate’er delight
Can make Day’s forehead bright
Or give down to the wings of night.
90
I wish her store
Of worth may leave her poor
Of wishes; and I wish — no more.
— Now, if Time knows
That Her, whose radiant brows
95
Weave them a garland of my vows;
Her, whose just bays
My future hopes can raise,
A trophy to her present praise;
Her that dares be
100
What these lines wish to see:
I seek no further, it is She.
’Tis She, and here
Lo! I unclothe and clear
My Wishes cloudy character.
105
May she enjoy it
Whose merit dare apply it.
But modesty dares still deny it!
Such worth as this is
Shall fix my flying Wishes,
110
And determine them to kisses.
Let her full glory,
My fancies, fly before ye;
Be ye my fictions: — but her story.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Upon the Book and Picture of the Seraphical Saint Teresa
Richard Crashaw (1613–1649)
LIVE in these conquering leaves: live all the same;
And walk through all tongues one triumphant flame;
Live here, great heart; and love, and die, and kill:
And bleed, and wound, and yield, and conquer still.
Let this immortal life where’er it comes
5
Walk in a crowd of loves and martyrdoms.
Let mystic deaths wait on’t; and wise souls be
The love-slain witnesses of this life of thee.
O sweet incendiary! show here thy art
Upon this carcase of a hard cold heart;
10
Let all thy scatter’d shafts of light, that play
Among the leaves of thy large books of day,
Combin’d against this breast at once break in,
And take away from me myself and sin;
This gracious robbery shall thy bounty be
15
And my best fortunes such fair spoils of me.
O thou undaunted daughter of desires!
By all thy dower of lights and fires;
By all the eagle in thee, all the dove;
By all thy lives and deaths of love;
20
By thy large draughts of intellectual day,
And by thy thirsts of love more large than they;
By all thy brim-filled bowls of fierce desire,
By thy last morning’s draught of liquid fire;
By the full kingdom of that final kiss
25
That seized thy parting soul, and sealed thee His;
By all the Heav’n thou hast in Him
(Fair sister of the seraphim!);
By all of Him we have in thee;
Leave nothing of myself in me.
30
Let me so read thy life, that I
Unto all life of mine may die!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Thomas Jordan (1612–1685)
LET us drink and be merry, dance, joke, and rejoice,
With claret and sherry, theorbo and voice!
The changeable world to our joy is unjust,
All treasure’s uncertain,
Then down with your dust!
5
In frolics dispose your pounds, shillings, and pence,
For we shall be nothing a hundred years hence.
We’ll sport and be free with Moll, Betty, and Dolly,
Have oysters and lobsters to cure melancholy:
Fish-dinners will make a man spring like a flea,
10
Dame Venus, love’s lady,
Was born of the sea:
With her and with Bacchus we’ll tickle the sense,
For we shall be past it a hundred years hence.
Your most beautiful bride who with garlands is crown’d
15
And kills with each glance as she treads on the ground.
Whose lightness and brightness doth shine in such splendour
That one but the stars
Are thought fit to attend her,
Though now she be pleasant and sweet to the sense,
20
Will be damnable mouldy a hundred years hence.
Then why should we turmoil in cares and in fears,
Turn all our tranquill’ty to sighs and to tears?
Let’s eat, drink, and play till the worms do corrupt us,
’Tis certain,
Post mortem
25
Nulla voluptas.
For health, wealth and beauty, wit, learning and sense,
Must all come to nothing a hundred years hence.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Abraham Cowley (1618–1667)
AWAKE, awake, my Lyre!
And tell thy silent master’s humble tale
In sounds that may prevail;
Sounds that gentle thoughts inspire:
Though so exalted she
5
And I so lowly be
Tell her, such different notes make all thy harmony.
Hark, how the strings awake:
And, though the moving hand approach not near,
Themselves with awful fear
10
A kind of numerous trembling make.
Now all thy forces try;
Now all thy charms apply;
Revenge upon her ear the conquests of her eye.
Weak Lyre! thy virtue sure
15
Is useless here, since thou art only found
To cure, but not to wound,
And she to wound, but not to cure.
Too weak too wilt thou prove
My passion to remove;
20
Physic to other ills, thou’rt nourishment to love.
Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre!
For thou canst never tell my humble tale
In sounds that will prevail,
Nor gentle thoughts in her inspire;
25
All thy vain mirth lay by,
Bid thy strings silent lie,
Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre, and let thy master die.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order