To One Married to an Old Man
Since thou wouldst needs,
Bewitched with some ill charms,
Be buried in those monumental arms,
All we can wish is, may that earth lie light
Upon thy tender limbs, and so goodnight.
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
While I Listen to Thy Voice
While I listen to thy voice,
Chloris, I feel my life decay;
That powerful noise
Calls my flitting soul away.
Oh! suppress that magic sound,
Which destroys without a wound.
Peace, Chloris, peace! or singing die,
That together you and I
To heaven may go;
For all we know
Of what the blessed do above
Is, that they sing and that they love.
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Song - Stay, Phoebus, stay!
Stay, Phoebus, stay!
The world to which you fly so fast,
Conveying day
From us to them, can pay your haste
With no such object, not salute your rise
With no such wonder, as De Mornay's eyes.
Well does this prove
The error of those antique books,
Which made you move
About the world; her charming looks
Would fix your beams, and make it ever day,
Did not the rolling earth snatch her away.
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
To a Lady Singing a Song of His Composing
Chloris! yourself you so excel,
When you vouchsafe to breathe my thought,
That, like a spirit, with this spell
Of my own teaching, I am taught.
That eagle's fate and mine are one,
Which, on the shaft that made him die,
Espied a feather of his own,
Wherewith he wont to soar so high.
Had Echo, with so sweet a grace,
Narcissus' loud complaints returned,
Not for reflection of his face,
But of his voice, the boy had burned.
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
On Tea
Venus her myrtle, Phoebus has her bays;
Tea both excels, which she vouchsafes to praise.
The best of Queens, and best of herbs, we owe
To that bold nation, which the way did show
To the fair region where the sun doth rise,
Whose rich productions we so justly prize.
The Muse's friend, tea does our fancy aid,
Repress those vapors which the head invade,
And keep the palace of the soul serene,
Fit on her birthday to salute the Queen.
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
On a Girdle
That which her slender waist confin'd,
Shall now my joyful temples bind;
No monarch but would give his crown,
His arms might do what this has done.
It was my heaven's extremest sphere,
The pale which held that lovely deer,
My joy, my grief, my hope, my love,
Did all within this circle move.
A narrow compass, and yet there
Dwelt all that's good, and all that's fair;
Give me but what this ribbon bound,
Take all the rest the sun goes round.
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
The Dancer
Behold the brand of beauty tossed!
See how the motion does dilate the flame!
Delighted love his spoils does boast,
And triumph in this game.
Fire, to no place confined,
Is both our wonder and our fear;
Moving the mind,
As lightning hurled through air.
High heaven the glory does increase
Of all her shining lamps, this artful way;
The sun in figures, such as these,
Joys with the moon to play.
To the sweet strains they all advance,
Which do result from their own spheres,
As this nymph's dance
Moves with the numbers which she hears.
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Old Age
The seas are quiet when the winds give o'er;
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 through chinks that Time hath 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.
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Song: Go, lovely rose!
Go, lovely rose!
Tell her that wastes her time and me
That now she knows,
When I resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.
Tell her that's young,
And shuns to have her graces spied,
That hadst thou sprung
In deserts, where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.
Small is the worth
Of beauty from the light retired;
Bid her come forth,
Suffer herself to be desired,
And not blush so to be admired.
Then die! that she
The common fate of all things rare
[...] Read more
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Go, lovely rose!
Go, lovely rose!
Tell her that wastes her time and me
That now she knows,
When I resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.
Tell her that's young,
And shuns to have her graces spied,
That hadst thou sprung
In deserts, where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.
Small is the worth
Of beauty from the light retired;
Bid her come forth,
Suffer herself to be desired,
And not blush so to be admired.
Then die! that she
The common fate of all things rare
[...] Read more
poem by Edmund Waller
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!