Short Poems

Love is the plant of peace and most precious of virtues;
For heaven hold it ne might, so heavy it seemed,
Till it had on earth yoten himself.
Was never leaf upon linden light thereafter,
As when it had of the fold flesh and blood taken;
Then was it portative and piercing as the point of a needle.
May no armour it let, neither high walls.
For-thy love leader of our Lord's folk of heaven.

Nor amaranthes, nor roses do bequeath
Unto this hearse, but tamarists and wine,
For that same thirst, though dead, yet doth him pine,
Which made him so carrouse while he drew breath.

The moon
ovoid
in the black press
sits
hugging his knees,
gone with thought
above
the ringed city.

Between thee and thy kingdom late with force
Spain happily hath sued a divorce;
And now thou may'st, as Christ did once of his,
Say, that thy kingdom not of this world is.

Drink, my horse, while we cross the autumn water!—
The stream is cold and the wind like a sword,
As we watch against the sunset on the sandy plain,
Far, far away, shadowy Lintao.
Old battles, waged by those long walls,
Once were proud on all men's tongues
But antiquity now is a yellow dust,
Confusing in the grasses its ruins and white bones.

Would you task the moon-ty'd hair,
To yon flagrant beau repair;
Where waving with the poppling vow,
The bantling fine will shelter you, &c.

WHILE in Morocco Modern Authors shine,
Pompously dull, and most absurdly fine;
While ev'n my pages own the Printer's pain,
His skill to strengthen trifles us'd in vain;
Lo! with bad type, brown paper, bound in C ALF ,
D EAN , D RAPIER , G ULLIVER , and B ICKERSTAFF !

Love whets the dullest wittes, his plagues be such;
But makes the wise, by pleasing, doat as much.
So wit is purchast by this dire disease:
Oh let me doat, so Love be bent to please.

My very good lord, 'tis a very hard task,
For a man to wait here, who has nothing to ask.

All things are hushed, as Nature's self lay dead;
The mountains seem to nod their drowsy head,
The little birds in dreams their song repeat,
And sleeping flowers beneath the night-dew sweat;
Even lust and envy sleep, yet love denies
Rest to my soul and slumber to my eyes.