The Penguin Book of English Verse

by Paul Keegan

  And alwayes in extream.

  Now with a noiseless gentle course

  It keeps within the middle Bed;

  Anon it lifts aloft the head,

  And bears down all before it, with impetuous force:

  And trunks of Trees come rowling down,

  Sheep and their Folds together drown:

  Both House and Homested into Seas are borne,

  And Rocks are from their old foundations torn,

  And woods made thin with winds, their scatter’d honours mourn.

  Happy the Man, and happy he alone,

  He, who can call to day his own:

  He, who secure within, can say

  To morrow do thy worst, for I have liv’d to day.

  Be fair, or foul, or rain, or shine,

  The joys I have possest, in spight of fate are mine.

  Not Heav’n it self upon the past has pow’r;

  But what has been, has been, and I have had my hour.

  Fortune, that with malicious joy,

  Does Man her slave oppress,

  Proud of her Office to destroy,

  Is seldome pleas’d to bless.

  Still various and unconstant still;

  But with an inclination to be ill;

  Promotes, degrades, delights in strife,

  And makes a Lottery of life.

  I can enjoy her while she’s kind;

  But when she dances in the wind,

  And shakes her wings, and will not stay,

  I puff the Prostitute away:

  The little or the much she gave, is quietly resign’d:

  Content with poverty, my Soul, I arm;

  And Vertue, tho’ in rags, will keep me warm.

  What is’t to me,

  Who never sail in her unfaithful Sea,

  If Storms arise, and Clouds grow black;

  If the Mast split and threaten wreck,

  Then let the greedy Merchant fear

  For his ill gotten gain;

  And pray to Gods that will not hear,

  While the debating winds and billows bear

  His Wealth into the Main.

  For me secure from Fortunes blows,

  (Secure of what I cannot lose,)

  In my small Pinnace I can sail,

  Contemning all the blustring roar;

  And running with a merry gale,

  With friendly Stars my safety seek

  Within some little winding Creek;

  And see the storm a shore.

  JOHN DRYDEN from Latter Part of the Third Book of Lucretius. Against the Fear of Death

  What has this Bugbear death to frighten Man,

  If Souls can die, as well as Bodies can?

  For, as before our Birth we felt no pain

  When Punique arms infested Land and Mayn,

  When Heav’n and Earth were in confusion hurl’d

  For the debated Empire of the World,

  Which aw’d with dreadful expectation lay,

  Sure to be Slaves, uncertain who shou’d sway:

  So, when our mortal frame shall be disjoyn’d,

  The lifeless Lump, uncoupled from the mind,

  From sense of grief and pain we shall be free;

  We shall not feel, because we shall not Be.

  Though Earth in Seas, and Seas in Heav’n were lost,

  We shou’d not move, we only shou’d be tost.

  Nay, ev’n suppose when we have suffer’d Fate,

  The Soul cou’d feel in her divided state,

  What’s that to us, for we are only we

  While Souls and bodies in one frame agree?

  Nay, tho’ our Atoms shou’d revolve by chance,

  And matter leape into the former dance;

  Tho’ time our Life and motion cou’d restore,

  And make our Bodies what they were before,

  What gain to us wou’d all this bustle bring,

  The new made man wou’d be another thing;

  When once an interrupting pause is made,

  That individual Being is decay’d.

  We, who are dead and gone, shall bear no part

  In all the pleasures, nor shall feel the smart,

  Which to that other Mortal shall accrew,

  Whom of our Matter Time shall mould anew.

  And therefore if a Man bemoan his lot,

  That after death his mouldring limbs shall rot,

  Or flames, or jaws of Beasts devour his Mass,

  Know he’s an unsincere, unthinking Ass.

  A secret Sting remains within his mind,

  The fool is to his own cast offals kind;

  He boasts no sense can after death remain,

  Yet makes himself a part of life again:

  As if some other He could feel the pain.

  JOHN DRYDEN from Fourth Book of Lucretius. Concerning the Nature of Love

  When Love its utmost vigour does imploy,

  Ev’n then, ’tis but a restless wandring joy:

  Nor knows the Lover, in that wild excess,

  With hands or eyes, what first he wou’d possess:

  But strains at all; and fast’ning where he strains,

  Too closely presses with his frantique pains:

  With biteing kisses hurts the twining fair,

  Which shews his joyes imperfect, unsincere:

  For stung with inward rage, he flings around,

  And strives t’ avenge the smart on that which gave the wound.

  But love those eager bitings does restrain,

  And mingling pleasure mollifies the pain.

  For ardent hope still flatters anxious grief,

  And sends him to his Foe to seek relief:

  Which yet the nature of the thing denies;

  For Love, and Love alone of all our joyes

  By full possession does but fan the fire,

  The more we still enjoy, the more we still desire.

  Nature for meat, and drink provides a space;

  And when receiv’d they fill their certain place;

  Hence thirst and hunger may be satisfi’d,

  But this repletion is to Love deny’d:

  Form, feature, colour, whatsoe’re delight

  Provokes the Lovers endless appetite,

  These fill no space, nor can we thence remove

  With lips, or hands, or all our instruments of love:

  In our deluded grasp we nothing find,

  But thin aerial shapes, that fleet before the mind.

  As he who in a dream with drought is curst,

  And finds no real drink to quench his thirst,

  Runs to imagin’d Lakes his heat to steep,

  And vainly swills and labours in his sleep;

  So Love with fantomes cheats our longing eyes,

  Which hourly seeing never satisfies;

  Our hands pull nothing from the parts they strain,

  But wander o’re the lovely limbs in vain:

  Nor when the Youthful pair more clossely joyn,

  When hands in hands they lock, and thighs in thighs they twine;

  Just in the raging foam of full desire,

  When both press on, both murmur, both expire,

  They gripe, they squeeze, their humid tongues they dart,

  As each wou’d force their way to t’others heart:

  In vain; they only cruze about the coast,

  For bodies cannot pierce, nor be in bodies lost:

  As sure they strive to be, when both engage,

  In that tumultuous momentary rage,

  So ’tangled in the Nets of Love they lie,

  Till Man dissolves in that excess of joy.

  Then, when the gather’d bag has burst its way,

  And ebbing tydes the slacken’d nerves betray,

  A pause ensues; and Nature nods a while,

  Till with recruited rage new Spirits boil;

  And then the same vain violence returns,

  With flames renew’d th’ erected furnace burns.

  Agen they in each ot
her wou’d be lost,

  But still by adamantine bars are crost;

  All wayes they try, successeless all they prove,

  To cure the secret sore of lingring love.

  1686

  EDMUND WALLER Of the Last Verses in the Book

  When we for Age could neither read nor write,

  The Subject made us able to indite.

  The Soul with Nobler Resolutions deckt,

  The Body stooping, does Herself erect:

  No Mortal Parts are requisite to raise

  Her, that Unbody’d can her Maker praise.

  The Seas are quiet, when the Winds give o’re;

  So calm are we, when Passions are no more:

  For then we know how vain it was to boast

  Of fleeting Things, so certain to be lost.

  Clouds of Affection from our younger Eyes

  Conceal that emptiness, which Age descries.

  The Soul’s dark Cottage, batter’d and decay’d,

  Lets in new Light thrò chinks that time has made;

  Stronger by weakness, wiser Men become

  As they draw near to their Eternal home:

  Leaving the Old, both Worlds at once they view,

  That stand upon the Threshold of the New.

  Miratur Limen Olympi

  Virgil

  1687

  PHILIP AYRES from the Greek of Theocritus. The Death ofAdonis

  When VENUS her ADONIS found,

  Just slain, and weltring on the Ground,

  With Hair disorder’d, gastly Look,

  And Cheeks their Roses had forsook;

  She bad the Cupids fetch with speed,

  The Boar that did this horrid Deed:

  They, to revenge Adonis Blood,

  As quick as Birds search’d all the Wood,

  And straight the murd’rous Creature found,

  Whom they, with Chains, securely bound;

  And whilst his Net one o’er him flung,

  To drag the Captive Boar along

  Another follow’d with his Bow,

  Pushing to make him faster go;

  Who most unwillingly obey’d,

  For he of VENUS was afraid.

  No sooner she the Boar espy’d,

  But, Oh! Thou cruel Beast, she cry’d,

  That hadst the Heart to wound this Thigh,

  How couldst thou kill so sweet a Boy?

  Great Goddess (said the Boar, and stood

  Trembling) I swear by all that’s Good,

  By thy Fair Self, by Him I’ve slain,

  These pretty Hunters, and this Chain;

  I did no Harm this Youth intend,

  Much less had Thought to kill your Friend:

  I gaz’d, and with my Passion strove,

  For with his Charms I fell in Love:

  At last that naked Thigh of his,

  With Lovers Heat I ran to kiss;

  Of Fatal Cause of all my Woe!

  ’Twas then I gave the heedless Blow.

  These Tusks with utmost Rigour draw,

  Cut, break, or tear them from my Jaw,

  ’Tis just I should these Teeth remove,

  Teeth that can have a Sense of Love;

  Or this Revenge, if yet too small,

  Cut off the Kissing Lips and all.

  When Venus heard this humble Tale,

  Pitty did o’er her Rage prevail,

  She bad them straight his Chains unty,

  And set the Boar at Liberty;

  Who ne’er to Wood return’d again,

  But follow’d Venus in her Train,

  And when by Chance to Fire he came,

  His Am’rous Tusks sing’d in the Flame.

  1688

  JANE BARKER To Her Lovers Complaint

  A Song

  If you complain your Flames are hot,

  ’Tis ’cause they are impure

  For strongest Spirits scorch us not,

  Their Flames we can endure.

  Love, like Zeal should be divine

  And ardent as the same;

  Like Stars, which in cold Weather shine,

  Or like a Lambent Flame.

  It shou’d be like the Morning Rays

  Which quickens, but not burns;

  Or th’ innocence of Childrens plays,

  Or Lamps in Antient urns.

  1689

  CHARLES COTTON Evening Quatrains

  The Day’s grown old, the fainting Sun

  Has but a little way to run,

  And yet his Steeds, with all his skill,

  Scarce lug the Chariot down the Hill.

  With Labour spent, and Thirst opprest,

  Whilst they strain hard to gain the West,

  From Fetlocks hot drops melted light,

  Which turn to Meteors in the Night.

  The Shadows now so long do grow,

  That Brambles like tall Cedars show,

  Mole-hills seem Mountains, and the Ant

  Appears a monstrous Elephant.

  A very little little Flock

  Shades thrice the ground that it would stock;

  Whilst the small Stripling following them,

  Appears a mighty Polypheme.

  These being brought into the Fold,

  And by the thrifty Master told,

  He thinks his Wages are well paid,

  Since none are either lost, or stray’d.

  Now lowing Herds are each-where heard,

  Chains rattle in the Villains Yard,

  The Cart’s on Tayl set down to rest,

  Bearing on high the Cuckolds Crest.

  The hedg is stript, the Clothes brought in,

  Nought’s left without should be within,

  The Bees are hiv’d, and hum their Charm,

  Whilst every House does seem a Swarm.

  The Cock now to the Roost is prest:

  For he must call up all the rest;

  The Sow’s fast pegg’d within the Sty,

  To still her squeaking Progeny.

  Each one has had his Supping Mess,

  The Cheese is put into the Press,

  The Pans and Bowls clean scalded all,

  Rear’d up against the Milk-house Wall.

  And now on Benches all are sat

  In the cool Air to sit and chat,

  Till Phœbus, dipping in the West,

  Shall lead the World the way to Rest.

  CHARLES COTTON An Epitaph on M.H.

  In this cold Monument lies one,

  That I know who has lain upon,

  The happier He: her Sight would charm,

  And Touch have kept King David warm.