Herbert Poems Flashcards
Made of a heart, and cemented with tears:
Whose parts are as thy hand did frame;
No workman’s tool hath touched the same.
The Altar
A Heart alone
Is such a stone,
As nothing but
Thy power doth cut.
Wherefore each part
Of my hard heart
Meets in this frame,
The Altar
To praise thy Name:
That, if I chance to hold my peace,
These stones to praise thee may not cease.
Oh let thy blessed sacrifice be mind,
And sanctify this _____ to be thine.
The Altar
Who says that fictions only and false hair
Become a verse? Is there in truth no beauty?
Is all good structure in a winding stair?
May no lines pass, except they do their duty
Not to a true, but painted chair?
Jordan (1)
Is it no verse, except enchanted groves
And sudden arbors shadow coarse-spun lines?
Must purling streams refresh a lover’s loves?
Must all be veiled, while he that reads, divines,
Catching the sense at two removes?
Jordan (1)
Shepherds are honest people: let them sing;
Riddle who list, for me, and pull for prime:
I envy no man’s nightingale or spring;
Nor let them punish me with loss of rhyme,
Who plainly say, My God, My king.
Jordan (1)
When first my lines of heavenly joys made mention,
Such was their luster they did so excel,
That I sought out quaint words and trim invention;
My thoughts began to burnish, sprout, and swell,
Curling with metaphors a plain intention,
Decking the sense, as if it were to sell.
Jordan (2)
Thousands of notions in my brain did run,
Offering their service, if I were not sped:
I often blotted what I had begun;
This was not quick enough, and that was dead.
Nothing could seem too rich to clothe the sun,
Much less those joys which trample on his head.
Jordan (2)
As flames do work and wind when they ascend,
So did I weave myself into the sense;
But while I bustled, I might hear a friend
Whisper, “How wide is all this long pretense!
There is in love a sweetness ready to be penned:
Copy out only that, and save expense.”
Jordan (2)
I struck the board and cried, “No more;
I will abroad!
What? Shall I ever sigh and pine?
My lines and life are free, free as the road,
Loose as the wind, as large as store.
The Collar
Shall I be still in suit?
Have I no harvest but a thorn
To let me blood, and not restore
What I have lost with cordial fruit?
Sure there was wine
Before my sights did dry it; there was corn
Before my tears did drown it.
The Collar
Is the year only lost to me?
Have I no bays to crown it,
No flowers, no garlands gay? All blasted?
All wasted?
Not so, my heart; but there is fruit,
And thou hast hands.
The Collar
Recover all thy sigh-blown age
On double pleasures: leave thy cold dispute
Of what is fit and not. Forsake thy cage,
Thy rope of sands,
Which petty thoughts have made, and made to thee
Good cable, to enforce and draw,
And be thy law,
While though didst wink and wouldst not see.
The Collar
Away! Take heed;
I will abroad.
Call in thy dewath’s-head there; tie up thy fears.
he that forbears
To suit and serve his need,
Deserves his load.”
The Collar
But as I raved and grew more fierce and wild
At every word,
Methoughts I heard one calling, Child!
And I replied, My Lord.
The Collar
