THE LOVER TO HIS LYRE. 29 THE LOVER TO HIS LYRE. AWAKE, awake, my Lyre! And tell thy silent master's humble tale 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, A kind of numerous trembling make. Now all thy charms apply: Revenge upon her ear the conquests of her eye! Weak Lyre! thy virtue sure 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: Physic to other ills, thou'rt nourishment to love. Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre! In sounds that will prevail, Nor gentle thoughts in her inspire. All thy vain mirth lay by, Bid thy strings silent lie: Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre, and let thy master die! Abraham Cowley. 30 LAMENT FOR ASTROPHEL. LAMENT FOR ASTROPHEL.* "WOODS, hills, and rivers, now are desolate, "What cruel hand of cursed foe unknown Great loss to all, but greatest loss to me. "Break now your girlonds, O ye shepherds' lasses! "Ne ever sing the love-lays which he made; * Sir Philip Sidney. 31 LAMENT FOR ASTROPHEL. "Death, the devourer of all world's delight, "O Death! that hast us of such riches reft, Scarce like the shadow of that which he was, "But that immortal spirit, which was deck'd With all the dowries of celestial grace, By sovereign choice from th' heavenly quires select, O what is now of it become? aread: "Ah! no: it is not dead, ne can it die, "There thousand birds, all of celestial brood, 32 LAMENT FOR ASTROPHEL. "But he them sees, and takes exceeding pleasure “There liveth he in everlasting bliss, "But live thou there still, happy, happy Spirit! E. Spenser. THE SHEPHERD'S ELEGY. 33 THE SHEPHERD'S ELEGY. GLIDE soft ye silver floods, And every spring: Let no bird sing! Nor from the grove a turtle dove Be seen to couple with her love; But silence on each dale and mountain dwell, But (of great Thetis' train) Ye mermaids fair, That on the shores do plain As Your sea-green hair, ye in trammels knit your locks Weep ye; and so enforce the rocks In heavy murmurs through the broad shores tell How Willy bade his friend and joy farewell. Cease, cease, ye murmuring winds To move a wave; But if with troubled minds You seek his grave, Know 'tis as various as yourselves, Now in the deep, then on the shelves, Elder Poets. 3 |