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ON HIS BLINDNESS

When I consider how my light is spent

Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide,
And that one talent which is death to hide
Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent

To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest He returning chide,-
"Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?"
I fondly ask: But Patience, to prevent

That murmur, soon replies; "God doth not need
Either man's work, or His own gifts: who best
Bear His mild yoke, they serve Him best: His state

"Is kingly; thousands at His bidding speed And post o'er land and ocean without rest: They also serve who only stand and wait."

John Milton

DROP, DROP, SLOW TEARS

Drop, drop, slow tears,

And bathe those beauteous feet

Which brought from Heaven

The news and Prince of Peace!

Cease not, wet eyes,

His mercy to entreat;

To cry for vengeance

Sin doth never cease;

In your deep floods

Drown all my faults and fears;

Nor let His eye

See sin but through my tears.

Phineas Fletcher

GRIEF

I tell you, hopeless grief is passionless-
That only men incredulous of despair,
Half-taught in anguish, through the midnight air,
Beat upward to God's throne in loud access
Of shrieking and reproach. Full desertness
In souls, as countries, lieth silent, bare,
Under the blanching, vertical eye-glare

Of the absolute Heavens. Deep-hearted man, express
Grief for thy Dead in silence like to death;
Most like a monumental statue set
In everlasting watch and moveless woe,
Till itself crumble to the dust beneath.
Touch it: the marble eyelids are not wet

If it could weep, it could arise and go.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I GIVE THEE ETERNITY

How many paltry, foolish, painted things,
That now in coaches trouble every street,
Shall be forgotten, whom no poet sings,

Ere they be well wrapped in their winding-sheet, Where I to thee eternity shall give

When nothing else remaineth of these days,
And queens hereafter shall be glad to live
Upon the alms of thy superfluous praise;

Virgins and matrons reading these, my rhymes,
Shall be so much delighted with thy story,

That they shall grieve they lived not in these times,
To have seen thee, their sex's only glory;

So shalt thou fly above the vulgar throng,
Still to survive in my immortal song.

Michael Drayton

I DO NOT LOVE THEE FOR THAT FAIR

I do not love thee for that fair
Rich fan of thy most curious hair,
Though the wires thereof be drawn
Finer than the threads of lawn,
And are softer than the leaves
On which the subtle spider weaves.

I do not love thee for those flowers
Growing on thy cheeks, - love's bowers, -
Though such cunning them hath spread,
None can paint them white and red.
Love's golden arrows thence are shot,
Yet for them I love thee not.

I do not love thee for those soft
Red coral lips I've kissed so oft;
Nor teeth of pearl, the double guard
To speech whence music still is heard,
Though from those lips a kiss being taken
Might tyrants melt, and death awaken.

I do not love thee, O my fairest,
For that richest, for that rarest
Silver pillar which stands under
Thy sound head, that globe of wonder;
Though that neck be whiter far
Than towers of polished ivory are.

Thomas Carew

STANZAS FOR MUSIC

There be none of Beauty's daughters
With a magic like Thee;
And like music on the waters

Is thy sweet voice to me:
When, as if its sound were causing
The charmed ocean's pausing,
The waves lie still and gleaming,
And the lull'd winds seem dreaming:

And the midnight moon is weaving
Her bright chain o'er the deep,
Whose breast is gently heaving
As an infant's asleep :

So the spirit bows before thee
To listen and adore thee;
With a full but soft emotion,

Like the swell of Summer's ocean.

Lord Byron

MY LOVE'S ATTIRE

My love in her attire doth show her wit,
It doth so well become her:

For every season she hath dressings fit,

For Winter, Spring, and Summer.

No beauty she doth miss

When all her robes are on:

But Beauty's self she is
When all her robes are gone.

Anon

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