Category: Poetry from 1600 - 1799 AD

A Red, Red Rose
"O my luve's like a red, red rose,
That's newly sprung in June;
O my luve's like the melodie
That's sweetly played in tune.


As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a' the seas gang dry.


Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi'the sun:
O I will love thee still, my dear,
While the sands o'life shall run.


And fare thee weel, my only luve,
And fare thee weel awhile!
And I will come again my luve,
Though it were ten thousand mile.


A Red, Red Rose
Robert Burns

When Love with unconfinéd wings
Hovers within my gates,
And my divine Althea brings
To whisper at the grates;
When I lie tangled in her hair,
And fettered to her eye,
The birds that wanton in the air
Know no such liberty.

When flowing cups run swiftly round
With no allaying Thames,
Our careless heads with roses bound,
Our hearts with loyal flames;
When thirsty grief in wine we steep,
When healths and draughts go free,
Fishes that tipple in the deep
Know no such liberty.

When, like committed linnets, I
With shriller throat shall sing
The sweetness, mercy, majesty,
And glories of my King;
When I shall voice aloud how good
He is, how great should be,
Enlargéd winds that curl the flood
Know no such liberty.

Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage;
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage.
If I have freedom in my love,
And in my soul am free,
Angels alone, that soar above,
Injoy such liberty.

To Althea, from Prison, Richard Lovelace

(Lovelace was a cavalier, and, therefore, was on the losing side in two consectutive civil wars in England from 1640-1649, which is why he writes from prison. This poem does not simply declare his [ostensible] love for Althea, but his political and religious testament, as well. He speaks of his admiration for his monarch, and asserts that he is free in his soul, in despite of those who imprison him--religious dissenters, in his eyes. He also wrote several poems to Lucasta, which were once quite famous, including To Lucasta, from Prison, an Epode, as well as other poetry to other ladies. Apparently, he had "freedom in [his] love," and, arguably, more than the ladies might well have cared for him to have had. heeheeheeheeheehee . . . . okbye)

All Kings, and all their favourites,
All glory of honours, beauties, wits,
The sun itself, which makes times, as they pass,
Is elder by a year now than it was
When thou and I first one another saw:
All other things to their destruction draw,
Only our love hath no decay;
This no tomorrow hath, nor yesterday,
Running it never runs from us away,
But truly keeps his first, last, everlasting day.

Two graves must hide thine and my corse;
If one might, death were no divorce.
Alas, as well as other Princes, we
(Who Prince enough in one another be)
Must leave at last in death these eyes and ears,
Oft fed with true oaths, and with sweet salt tears;
But souls where nothing dwells but love
(All other thoughts being inmates) then shall prove
This, or a love increased there above,
When bodies to their graves, souls from their graves remove.

And then we shall be thoroughly blest;
But we no more than all the rest.
Here upon earth we're Kings, and none but we
Can be such Kings, nor of such subjects be;
Who is so safe as we? where none can do
Treason to us, except one of us two.
True and false fears let us refrain,
Let us love nobly, and live, and add again
Years and years unto years, till we attain
To write threescore: this is the second of our reign.


The Anniversary, by John Donne


Donne lived from 1572 to 1631, which means his lifetime straddled both this thread and the chronologically previous one. I've added this poem here because it just seems to me to fit better here.

Those Lips!bb
"Take, Oh, take those lips away
That so sweetly were forsworn
And those eyes, like break of day,
Lights that do mislead the morn;
But my kisses bring again,
Seals of love, though sealed in vain.


Hide, oh, hide those hills of snow,
Which thy frozen bosom bears,
On whose tops the pinks that grow
Are of those that April wears;
But first set my poor heart free,
Bound in those icy chains by thee".


Take, Oh, take Those Lips Away
John Fletcher ( 1639 )

Upon Julia's Clothes
"When as in silks my Julia goes,
Then, then, methinks, how sweetly flows
That liquefaction of her clothes.


Next, when I cast mine eyes and see
That brave vibration each way free,
O how that glittering taketh me"!


Upon Julia's Clothes

Robert Herrick

Death, Be Not Proud
"Death, be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;

For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow

Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,

Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,

And soonest our best men with thee do go,

Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.

Thou'rt slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with poison, war and sickness dwell;

And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well

And better than thy stroke; why swell'st though then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally,

And death shall be no more: Death, thou shalt die.



Death, Be Not Proud
John Donne ( 1633 )

New Haven,

I have long enjoyed the poems of Robert Herrick, and bbelieve you have chosen the best of them. I think the metaphor in the phrase "liquefaction of her clothes" is among the best in lyric poetry.

Another selection of his you might enjoy;

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