Yet--through all the years to come-- Men to whom my songs are dumb Will remember them and me For that one cry of jealousy, That curse where I had come to bless, That harsh voice of unhappiness. They'll note the curse, but not the pang, Not the torment whence it sprang, They'll note the blow at my friend's back, But not the soul stretched on the rack. They'll note the weak convulsive sting, Not the crushed body and broken wing.
_Item_, for my thirty years, Dashed with sun and splashed with tears, Wan with revel, red with wine, This Jack-o-lanthorn life of mine. Other wiser, happier men, Take the full three-score-and-ten, Climb slow, and seek the sun. Dancing down is soon done. Golden boys, beware, beware,-- The ambiguous oracles declare Loving gods for those that die Young, as old men may; but I, Quick as was my pilgrimage, Wither in mine April age.
_Item_, one groatsworth of wit, Bought at an exceeding price, Ay, a million of repentance. Let me pay the whole of it. Lying here these deadly nights, Lads, for me the Mermaid lights Gleam as for a castaway Swept along a midnight sea The harbour-lanthorns, each a spark, A pin-prick in the solid dark, That lets trickle through a ray Glorious out of Paradise, To stab him with new agony. Let me pay, lads, let me pay! Let the Mermaid pass the sentence: I am pleading guilty now, A dead leaf on the laurel-bough, And the storm whirls me away.
Kit Marlowe ceased; but not the wailing wind That round and round the silent Mermaid Inn Wandered, with helpless fingers trying the doors, Like a most desolate ghost.
A sudden throng Of players bustled in, shaking the rain From their plumed hats. "Veracious witnesses," The snuffle of Bame arose anew, "declare It was a surfeit killed him, Rhenish wine And pickled herrings. His shirt was very foul. He had but one. His doublet, too, was frayed, And his boots broken ..."
"What! Gonzago, you!" A short fat player called in a deep voice Across the room and, throwing aside his cloak To show the woman's robe he wore beneath, Minced up to Bame and bellowed--"'Tis such men As you that tempt us women to our fall!" And all the throng of players rocked and roared, Till at a nod and wink from Kit a hush Held them again.