Classic Poem

To her the lowly nymph (Humblessa hight)
Brought as her office this deformed wight;
To whom the lady courteous semblance shows,
And pitying his estate in sacred thewes,
And letters worthily ycleep'd divine,
Resolv'd t' instruct him: but her discipline
She knew of true effect would surely miss,
Except she first his metamorphosis
Should clean exile: and knowing that his birth
Was to inherit reason, though on earth
Some witch had thus transform'd him, by her skill,
Expert in changing, even the very will,
In few days' labours with continual prayer,
(A sacrifice transcends the buxom air)
His grisly shape, his foul deformed feature,
His horrid looks, worse than a savage creature,
By Metanoia's hand from heaven, began
Receive their sentence of divorce from man.
And as a lovely maiden, pure and chaste,
With naked iv'ry neck, and gown unlac'd,
Within her chamber, when the day is fled,
Makes poor her garments to enrich her bed:
First, puts she off her lily-silken gown,
That shrieks for sorrow as she lays it down;
And with her arms graceth a waistcoat fine,
Embracing her as it would ne'er untwine.
Her flaxen hair, ensnaring all beholders,
She next permits to wave about her shoulders,
And though she cast it back, the silken slips
Still forward steal and hang upon her lips:
Whereat she sweetly angry, with her laces
Binds up the wanton locks in curious traces,
Whilst (twisting with her joints) each hair long lingers,
As loth to be enchain'd but with her fingers.
Then on her head a dressing like a crown;
Her breasts all bare, her kirtle slipping down,
And all things off (which rightly ever be
Call'd the foul-fair marks of our misery)
Except her last, which enviously doth seize her,
Lest any eye partake with it in pleasure,
Prepares for sweetest rest, while sylvans greet her,
And longingly the down bed swells to meet her:
So by degrees his shape all brutish vild,
Fell from him (as loose skin from some young child)
In lieu whereof a man-like shape appears,
And gallant youth scarce skill'd in twenty years,
So fair, so fresh, so young, so admirable
In every part, that since I am not able
In words to show his picture, gentle swains,
Recall the praises in my former strains;
And know if they have graced any limb,
I only lent it those, but stole 't from him.
Had that chaste Roman dame beheld his face,
Ere the proud king possess'd her husband's place,
Her thoughts had been adulterate, and this stain
Had won her greater fame had she been slain.
The lark that many morns herself makes merry
With the shrill chanting of her teery-lerry,
(Before he was transform'd) would leave the skies,
And hover o'er him to behold his eyes.
Upon an oaten pipe well could he play,
For when he fed his flock upon the lay
Maidens to hear him from the plains came tripping,
And birds from bough to bough full nimbly skipping;
His flock (then happy flock) would leave to feed,
And stand amaz'd to listen to his reed;
Lions and tigers, with each beast of game,
With hearing him were many times made tame;
Brave trees and flowers would towards him be bending,
And none that heard him wish'd his song an ending:
Maids, lions, birds, flocks, trees, each flower, each spring
Were wrapt with wonder when he used to sing.
So fair a person to describe to men
Requires a curious pencil, not a pen.
Him Metanoia clad in seemly wise
(Not after our corrupted age's guise,
Where gaudy weeds lend splendour to the limb,
While that his clothes receiv'd their grace from him),
Then to a garden set with rarest flowers,
With pleasant fountains stor'd and shady bowers,
She leads him by the hand, and in the groves,
Where thousand pretty birds sung to their loves,
And thousand thousand blossoms (from their stalks)
Mild Zephyrus threw down to paint the walks:
Where yet the wild boar never durst appear:
Here Fida (ever to kind Raymond dear)
Met them, and show'd where Aletheia lay,
The fairest maid that ever bless'd the day.
Sweetly she lay, and cool'd her lily hands
Within a spring that threw up golden sands:
As if it would entice her to persever
In living there, and grace the banks for ever.
To her Amintas (Riot now no more)
Came, and saluted: never man before
More bless'd, nor like this kiss hath been another
But when two dangling cherries kiss'd each other:
Nor ever beauties, like, met at such closes,
But in the kisses of two damask roses.
O how the flowers (press'd with their treadings on them)
Strove to cast up their heads to look upon them!
How jealously the buds that so had seen them
Sent forth the sweetest smells to step between them,
As fearing the perfume lodg'd in their powers
Once known of them, they might neglect the flowers.
How often wish'd Amintas with his heart,
His ruddy lips from hers might never part;
And that the heavens this gift were them bequeathing,
To feed on nothing but each other's breathing!
A truer love the Muses never sung,
Nor happier names e'er grac'd a golden tongue.
O! they are better fitting his sweet stripe,
Who on the banks of Ancor tun'd his pipe:
Or rather for that learned swain whose lays
Divinest Homer crown'd with deathless bays:
Or any one sent from the sacred Well
Inheriting the soul of Astrophel:
These, these in golden lines might write this story,
And make these loves their own eternal glory:
Whilst I, a swain as weak in years as skill,
Should in the valley hear them on the hill.
Yet when my sheep have at their cistern been,
And I have brought them back to shear the green,
To miss an idle hour, and not for meed,
With choicest relish shall mine oaten reed
Record their worths: and though in accents rare
I miss the glory of a charming air,
My Muse may one day make the courtly swains
Enamour'd on the music of the plains,
And as upon a hill she bravely sings,
Teach humble dales to weep in crystal springs.