|
| To die with them, and in their graves be hid, |
| As Saxon wives, and French soldarii did; |
| And though in no degree I can expresse |
| Griefe in great Alexanders great excesse, |
| Who at his friends death made whole townes devest |
| Their wals and bullwarks, which became them best: |
| Doe not faire soule this sacrifice refuse, |
| That in thy grave I doe interre my Muse, |
| Which, by my griefe, great as thy worth, being cast |
| Behind hand, yet hath spoke, and spoke her last. |
|
| Elegie on the Lady Markham. |
|
| Man is the World, and death th' Ocean, |
| To which God gives the lower parts of man. |
| This Sea invirons all, and though as yet |
| God hath set markes, and bounds, 'twixt us and it, |
| Yet doth it rore, and gnaw, and still pretend. |
| And breakes our banke, when ere it takes a friend. |
| Then our land waters (teares of passion) vent; |
| Our waters, then above our firmament, |
| (Teares which our Soule doth for her sinnes let fall) |
| Take all a brackish taste, and Funerall. |
| And even those teares, which should wash sin, are sin. |
| We, after Gods No, drowne the world againe. |
| Nothing but man of all invenom'd things |
| Doth worke upon itselfe with inborne stings. |
| Teares are false Spectacles, we cannot see |
| Through passions mist, what we are, or what shee.
|
[CW: In] |