Dear chorister, who from those shadows sends, Ere that the blushing morn dare show her light, Such sad, lamenting strains, that night attends, Become all ear; stars stay to hear thy plight, If one whose grief even reach of thought transcends, Who ne'er, not in a dream, did taste delight, May thee importune who like case pretends, And seems to joy in woe, in woe's despite. Tell me (so may thou fortune milder try, And long, long sing) for what thou thus complains, Since winter's gone, and sun in dappled sky, Enamour'd, smiles on woods and flowery plains? The bird, as if my questions did her move, With trembling wings sigh'd forth, 'I love, I love.'
Sweet soul, which, in the April of thy years, For to enrich the heaven mad'st poor this round, And now, with flaming rays of glory crown'd, Most blest abides above the sphere of spheres; If heavenly laws, alas! have not thee bound From looking to this globe that all upbears, If ruth and pity there above be found, Oh, deign to lend a look unto these tears, Do not disdain, dear ghost, this sacrifice, And though I raise not pillars to thy praise, My offerings take, let this for me suffice, My heart a living pyramid I raise: And whilst kings' tombs with laurels flourish green, Thine shall with myrtles and these flowers be seen.
Look, how the flower which ling'ringly doth fade, The morning's darling late, the summer's queen, Spoil'd of that juice which kept it fresh and green, As high as it did raise, bows low the head: Right so the pleasures of my life being dead, Or in their contraries but only seen, With swifter speed declines than erst it spread, And, blasted, scarce now shows what it hath been. As doth the pilgrim, therefore, whom the night By darkness would imprison on his way, Think on thy home, my soul, and think aright, Of what's yet left thee of life's wasting day; Thy sun posts westward, passed is thy morn, And twice it is not given thee to be born.
The weary mariner so fast not flies A howling tempest, harbour to attain; Nor shepherd hastes, when frays of wolves arise, So fast to fold, to save his bleating train, As I, wing'd with contempt and just disdain, Now fly the world, and what it most doth prize, And sanctuary seek, free to remain From wounds of abject times, and Envy's eyes. To me this world did once seem sweet and fair, While senses' light mind's prospective kept blind, Now, like imagined landscape in the air, And weeping rainbows, her best joys I find: Or if aught here is had that praise should have, It is a life obscure, and silent grave.