Abraham Cowley: Verses about Water

The fish around her crowded, as they do
To the false light that treacherous fisher shew,
And all with as much ease might taken be,
As she at first took me;
For ne'er did light so clear
Among the waves appear,
Though every night the sun himself set there.

Why to mute fish shouldst thou thyself discover
And not to me, thy no less silent lover?
As some from men their buried gold commit
To ghosts, that have no use of it;
Half their rich treasures so
Maids bury; and for aught we know,
(Poor ignorants!) They're mermaids all below.

The amorous waves would fain about her stay,
But still new amorous waves drive them away,
And with swift current to those joys they haste
That do as swiftly waste:
I laugh'd the wanton play to view;
But 't is, alas! at land so too,
And still old lovers yield the place to new.

Kiss her, and as you part, you amorous waves
(My happier rivals, and my fellow-slaves)
Point to your flowery banks, and to her shew
The good your bounties do;
Then tell her what your pride doth cost,
And how your use and beauty's lost,
When rigorous winter binds you up with frost.

Tell her, her beauties and her youth, like thee,
Haste without stop to a devouring sea;
Where they will mix'd and undistinguish'd lie
With all the meanest things that die;
As in the ocean thou
No privilege dost know
Above th' impurest streams that thither flow.

Tell her, kind flood! When this has made her sad,
Tell her there's yet one remedy to be had;
Show her how thou, though long since past, dost find
Thyself yet still behind:
Marriage (say to her) will bring
About the self-same thing.
But she, fond maid, shuts and seals-up the spring.

Pindarum quisquis studet oemulari, &c.


I.
Pindar is imitable by none;
The phoenix Pindar is a vast species alone.
Whoe'er but Daedalus with waxen wings could fly
And neither sink too low nor soar too high?
What could he who followed claim
But of vain boldness the unhappy fame,
And by his fall a sea to name?
Pindar's unnavigable song,
Like a swollen flood from some steep mountain, pours along;
The ocean meets with such a voice
From his enlarged mouth as drowns the ocean's noise.

II.
So Pindar does new words and figures roll
Down his impetuous dithyrambic tide,
Which in no channel deigns to abide,
Which neither banks nor dikes control.
Whether the immortal gods he sings
In a no less immortal strain,
Or the great acts of god-descended kings,
Who in his numbers still survive and reign,
Each rich embroidered line,
Which their triumphant brows around
By his sacred hand is bound,
Does all their starry diadems outshine.

III.
Whether at Pisa's race he please
To carve in polished verse the conquerors' images,
Whether the swift, the skillful, or the strong
Be crowned in his nimble, artful, vigorous song,
Whether some brave young man's untimely fate
In words worth dying for he celebrate,
Such mournful and such pleasing words
As joy to his mother's and his mistress' grief affords,
He bids him live and grow in fame;
Among the stars he sticks his name;
The grave can but the dross of him devour,
So small is death's, so great the poet's power.

Lo, how the obsequious wind and swelling air
The Theban swan does upwards bear
Into the walks of clouds, where he does play,
And with extended wings opens his liquid way,
Whilst, alas, my timorous Muse
Unambitious tracks pursues;
Does, with weak, unballast wings,
About the mossy brooks and springs,
About the trees' new-blossomed heads,
About the gardens' painted beds,
About the fields and flowery meads,
And all inferior beauteous things,
Like the laborious bee,
For little drops of honey flee,
And there with humble sweets contents her industry.

First-born of Chaos, who so fair didst come
From the old Negro's darksome womb!
Which, when it saw the lovely child,
The melancholy mass put on kind looks and smiled,

Thou tide of glory which no rest dost know,
But ever ebb and ever flow!
Thou golden shower of a true Jove,
Who does in thee descend, and heaven to earth make love!

Hail, active nature's watchful life and health,
Her joy, her ornament and wealth!
Hail to thy husband Heat, and thee!
Thou the world's beauteous bride, the lusty bridegroom he!

Say, from what golden quivers of the sky
Do all thy winged arrows fly?
Swiftness and power by birth are thine:
From thy great Sire they came, thy Sire the Word divine.

'Tis, I believe, this archery to show,
That so much cost in colors thou,
And skill in painting, dost bestow
Upon thy ancient arms, the gaudy heavenly bow.

Swift as light thoughts their empty career run,
Thy race is finished when begun;
Let a post-angel start with thee,
And thou the goal of earth shalt teach as soon as he.

Thou in the moon's bright chariot, proud and gay,
Dost thy bright wood of stars survey,
And all the year dost with thee bring,
Of thousand flowery lights, thine own nocturnal spring.

Thou Scythian-like dost round thy lands, above
The sun's gilt tent, forever move,
And still, as thou in pomp dost go,
The shining pageants of the world attend thy show.

Nor amidst all these triumphs dost thou scorn
The humble glowworms to adorn,
And with those living spangles gild -
O greatness without pride! - the bushes of the field.

Night and her ugly subjects thou dost fright,
And sleep, the lazy owl of night;
Ashamed and fearful to appear,
They screen their horrid shapes with the black hemisphere.

With 'em there hastes, and wildly takes the alarm,
Of painted dreams, a busy swarm;
At the first openings of thine eye,
The various clusters break, the antic atoms fly.

The guilty serpents and obscener beasts
Creep conscious to their secret rests;
Nature to thee does reverence pay;
Ill omens and ill sights removes out of thy way.

At thy appearance, Grief itself is said
To shake his wings and rouse his head.
And cloudy Care has often took
A gentle beamy smile reflected from thy look.

At thy appearance, Fear itself grows bold;
Thy sunshine melts away his cold.
Encouraged at the sight of thee,
To the cheek color comes, and firmness to the knee.

Even Lust, the master of a hardened face,
Blushes if thou beest in the place,
To darkness' curtains he retires;
In sympathizing night he rolls his smoky fires.

When, goddess, thou list'st up thy wakened head
Out of the morning's purple bed,
Thy quire of birds about thee play,
And all the joyful world salutes the rising day.

The ghosts and monster spirits that did presume
A body's privilege to assume
Vanish again invisibly,
And bodies gain again their visibility.

All the world's bravery that delights our eyes
Is but thy several liveries;
Thou the rich dye on them bestow'st;
Thy nimble pencil paints this landscape as thou go'st.

A crimson garment in the rose thou wear'st;
A crown of studded gold thou bear'st;
The virgin blies in their white
Are clad but with the lawn of almost naked light.

The violet, spring's little infant, stands
Girt in thy purple swaddling-bands;
On the fair tulip thou dost dote;
Thou cloth'st it in a gay and parti-colored coat.

With flame condensed thou dost the jewels fix,
And solid colors in it mix;
Flora herself envies to see
Flowers fairer than her own, and durable as she.

Ah, goddess! would thou couldst thy hand withhold
And be less liberal to gold;
Didst thou less value to it give,
Of how much care, alas! mightst thou poor man relieve!

To me the sun is more delightful far,
And all fair days much fairer are,
But few, ah wondrous few, there be
Who do not gold prefer, O goddess, even to thee.

Through the soft ways of heaven, and air, and sea,
Which open all their pores to thee,
Like a clear river thou dost glide,
And with thy living stream through the close channels slide.

But where firm bodies thy free course oppose,
Gently thy source the land o'erflows,
Takes there possession, and does make
Of colors mingled, light, a thick and standing lake.

But the vast ocean of unbounded day
In the empyrean heaven does stay.
Thy rivers, lakes, and springs below
From thence took first their rise, thither at last must flow.