Beneath this gloomy shade,
By Nature only for my sorrows made,
I’ll spend this voyce in crys,
In tears I’ll waste these eyes
By Love so vainly fed;
So Lust of old the Deluge punished.
Ah wretched youth! said I,
“Ah, wretched youth!” twice did I sadly cry:
“Ah, wretched youth!” the fields and floods reply.
When thoughts of Love I entertain,
I meet no words but “Never,” and “In vain.”
“Never” alas that dreadful name
Which fuels the infernal flame:
“Never,” My time to come must waste;
“In vain,” torments the present and the past.
“In vain, in vain!” said I;
“In vain, in vain!” twice did I sadly cry;
“In vain, in vain!” the fields and floods reply.
No more shall fields or floods do so;
For I to shades more dark and silent go:
All this world’s noise appears to me
A dull ill-acted comedy:
No comfort to my wounded sight,
In the suns busy and imperti’nent Light.
Then down I laid my head;
Down on cold earth; and for a while was dead,
And my freed soul to a strange somewhere fled.
“Ah, sottish Soul” said I,
When back to its cage again I saw it fly;
“Fool to resume her broken chain!
And row her galley here again!”
“Fool, to that body to return
Where it condemn’d and destin’d is to burn!
Once dead, how can it be,
Death should a thing so pleasant seem to thee,
That thou should’st come to live it o’re again in me?”
Abraham Cowley
(Abraham Cowley)
More Poetry from Abraham Cowley:
Abraham Cowley Poems based on Topics: Love, Light, Death & Dying, Sense & Perception, Past, Youth, Fool, Cry, Present, Punishment, Comedy- To The Royal Society (excerpts) (Abraham Cowley Poems)
- Hymn To Light (Abraham Cowley Poems)
- To The Royal Society (Abraham Cowley Poems)
- Hymn. To Light (Abraham Cowley Poems)
- On the Death of Mr. Crashaw (Abraham Cowley Poems)
- On the Death of Mr. William Hervey (Abraham Cowley Poems)
Readers Who Like This Poem Also Like:
Based on Topics: Love Poems, Light Poems, Death & Dying Poems, Youth Poems, Sense & Perception Poems, Cry Poems, Past Poems, Fool Poems, Present Poems, Punishment Poems, Comedy PoemsBased on Keywords: voyce, crys, cowley, nent, sottish, fuels