Short Poems

While you, my D APHNIS , on the leafy Bed,
To Slumber sweet recline your weary Head,
While on each Hill is plac'd the frequent Net,
Thee wanton Pan pursues with eager Feet:
With him S YLVANUS , crown'd with Ivy pale,
Thy cooling Cavern seeks o'er Hill and Dale.
O fly; prevent their rude resistless Hands,
And burst ambrosial Slumber's magic Bands.

What is the thing of greatest price,
The whole creation, round?
That which was lost in paradise;
That which in Christ is found.
The soul of man, Jehovah's breath;
It keeps two worlds in strife.
Hell works beneath its work of death,
Heaven stoops to give it life.

The hills,
And the stars,
And the white waters
With their ever varying,
Yet ceaseless sound.

Gloom of a leaden sky
Too heavy for hope to move;
Grief in my heart to vie
With the dark distress above;
Yet happy, happy am I—
For I sorrow with her I love.

Amid the branches of the silv'ry bowers
The nightingale doth sing: perchance he knows
That spring hath come, and takes the later snows
For the white petals of the plum's sweet flowers.

As round as an apple,
As deep as a pail;
It never cries out
Till it's caught by the tail.

This great household, Dulam, is a boat upon the stream.
One here, one there descends: wayfaring folk are all.

Who coming to this world, Dulam, can harbour pride?
Life lasts some few brief days, and at the end is dust.

Dulam, this frame's a tomb: how can one picture it?
The living soul, when dead, enters this tomb again.

Q. How is the Creed now stollen from us away?
A. The ten Commandements gone, it would not stay.
Q. Then haue we no Commandements? O wonder!
A. Yes, wee haue one for all, goe fight and plunder.

Knowledge, to me, is wearisome from books,
I learn so readily from words and looks.
Give me yourself as free as air and rain.
I'll drink, I'll think, and send you flowers again.

What Art can prevail o'er this wonderful Dame?
In Water she Burns, and she Freezes Flame!