Short Poems

Lay a garland on my hearse,
Of the dismal yew,
Maidens, willow branches bear,
Say I died true.
My love was false, but I was firm
From my hour of birth;
Upon my buried body lie
Lightly, gentle earth.

Much suspected by me,
Nothing proved can be,
Quoth Elizabeth prisoner.

Never think you fortune can bear the sway
Where virtue's force can cause her to obey.

No crooked leg, no bleared eye,
No part deformed out of kind,
Nor yet so ugly half can be
As is the inward suspicious mind.

Here, a little child, I stand,
Heaving up my either hand:
Cold as paddocks though they be,
Here I lift them up to thee,
For a benison to fall
On our meat, and on us all.
Amen.

Bell-man of night, if I about shall go
For to deny my Master, do thou crow!
Thou stop'st Saint Peter in the midst of sin;
Stay me, by crowing, ere I do begin;
Better it is, premonish'd, for to shun
A sin, than fall to weeping when 'tis done.

O earth! earth! earth! hear thou my voice, and be
Loving and gentle for to cover me!
Banish'd from thee I live;--ne'er to return,
Unless thou giv'st my small remains an urn.

Give me a cell
To dwell,
Where no foot hath
A path;
There will I spend,
And end,
My wearied years
In tears.

When I consider, dearest, thou dost stay
But here awhile, to languish and decay;
Like to these garden glories, which here be
The flowery-sweet resemblances of thee:
With grief of heart, methinks, I thus do cry,
Would thou hadst ne'er been born, or might'st not die!

First, for effusions due unto the dead,
My solemn vows have here accomplished;
Next, how I love thee, that my grief must tell,
Wherein thou liv'st for ever.--Dear, farewell!