Henry Howard: Verses about Tears

So cruel prison how could betide, alas,
As proud Windsor? Where I in lust and joy
With a king's son my childish years did pass
In greater feast than Priam's sons of Troy;
Where each sweet place returns a taste full sour:
The large green courts, where we were wont to hove,
With eyes cast up unto the maidens' tower,
And easy sighs, such as folk draw in love;
The stately salles, the ladies bright of hue,
The dances short, long tales of great delight;
With words and looks that tigers could but rue,
Where each of us did plead the other's right;
The palm play where, despoiled for the game,
With dazed eyes oft we by gleams of love
Have miss'd the ball and got sight of our dame,
To bait her eyes, which kept the leads above;
The gravel'd ground, with sleeves tied on the helm,
On foaming horse, with swords and friendly hearts,
With cheer, as though the one should overwhelm,
Where we have fought, and chased oft with darts;
With silver drops the mead yet spread for ruth,
In active games of nimbleness and strength,
Where we did strain, trailed by swarms of youth,
Our tender limbs that yet shot up in length;
The secret groves which oft we made resound
Of pleasant plaint and of our ladies' praise,
Recording oft what grace each one had found,
What hope of speed, what dread of long delays;
The wild forest, the clothed holt with green,
With reins aval'd, and swift ybreathed horse,
With cry of hounds and merry blasts between,
Where we did chase the fearful hart a force;
The void walls eke that harbor'd us each night,
Wherewith, alas, revive within my breast
The sweet accord, such sleeps as yet delight,
The pleasant dreams, the quiet bed of rest;
The secret thoughts imparted with such trust,
The wanton talk, the divers change of play,
The friendship sworn, each promise kept so just,
Wherewith we pass'd the winter nights away.
And with this thought the blood forsakes the face,
The tears berain my cheeks of deadly hue,
The which as soon as sobbing sighs (alas)
Upsupped have, thus I my plaint renew:
"O place of bliss, renewer of my woes,
Give me account--where is my noble fere?
Whom in thy walls thou didst each night enclose,
To other lief, but unto me most dear."
Echo (alas) that doth my sorrow rue,
Returns thereto a hollow sound of plaint.
Thus I alone, where all my freedom grew,
In prison pine with bondage and restraint;
And with remembrance of the greater grief
To banish the less, I find my chief relief.

BOOK II

They whisted all, with fixed face attent,
When Prince AEneas from the royal seat
Thus gan to speak: O Queen, it is thy will
I should renew a woe cannot be told,
How that the Greeks did spoil and overthrow
The Phrygian wealth and wailful realm of Troy;
Those ruthful things that I myself beheld,
And whereof no small part fell to my share;
Which to express, who could refrain from tears?
What Myrmidon? or yet what Dolopes?
What stern Ulysses' waged soldier?
And lo! moist night now from the welkin falls,
And stars declining counsel us to rest.
But since so great is thy delight to hear
Of our mishaps and Troy last decay,
Though to record the same my mind abhors
And plaint eschews, yet thus will I begin.


The Greek chieftains, all irk'd with the war,
Wherein they wasted had so many years,
And oft repuls'd by fatal destiny,
A huge horse made, high raised like a hill,
By the divine science of Minerva,-
Of cloven fir compacted were his ribs,-
For their return a feigned sacrifice,-
The fame whereof so wander'd it at point.
In the dark bulk they clos'd bodies of men,
Chosen by lot, and did enstuff by stealth
The hollow womb with armed soldiers.


There stands in sight an isle hight Tenedon,
Rich and of fame while Priam's kingdom stood,
Now but a bay and road unsure for ship.
Hither them secretly the Greeks withdrew,
Shrouding themselves under the desert shore;
And weening we they had been fled and gone,
And with that wind had fet the land of Greece,
Troy{:e} discharg'd her long continued dole.
The gates cast up, we issued out to play,
The Greekish camp desirous to behold,
The places void and the forsaken coasts.
Here Pyrrhus' band, there fierce Achilles', pight;
Here rode their ships, there did their battles join.
Astonied some the scathful gift beheld,
Behight by vow unto the chaste Minerve,
All wond'ring at the hugeness of the horse.
And first of all Tim?tes gan advise
Within the walls to lead and draw the same,
And place it eke amid the palace court,-
Whether of guile, or Troyes fate it would.
Capys, with some of judgment more discreet,
Will'd it to drown, or underset with flame,
The suspect present of the Greek's deceit,
Or bore and gauge the hollow caves uncouth;
So diverse ran the giddy people's mind.


Lo! foremost of a rout that follow'd him,
Kindled La?n hasted from the tower,
Crying far off: 'O wretched citizens,
What so great kind of frenzy fretteth you?
Deem ye the Greeks, our enemies, to be gone?
Or any Greekish gifts can you suppose
Devoid of guile? Is so Ulysses known?
Either the Greeks are in this timber hid,
Or this an engine is to annoy our walls,
To view our towers, and overwhelm our town.
Here lurks some craft. Good Troyans, give no trust
Unto this horse, for, whatsoever it be,
I dread the Greeks, yea, when they offer gifts.'

IN winter's just return, when Boreas gan his reign,
And every tree unclothed fast, as nature taught them plain :
In misty morning dark, as sheep are then in hold,
I hied me fast, it sat me on, my sheep for to unfold.
And as it is a thing that lovers have by fits,
Under a palm I heard one cry as he had lost his wits.
Whose voice did ring so shrill in uttering of his plaint,
That I amazed was to hear how love could him attaint.
' Ah ! wretched man,' quoth he ; 'come, death, and rid this woe ;
A just reward, a happy end, if it may chance thee so.
Thy pleasures past have wrought thy woe without redress ;
If thou hadst never felt no joy, thy smart had been the less.'
And rechless* of his life, he gan both sigh and groan :
A rueful thing me thought it was, to hear him make such moan.
'Thou cursed pen,' said he, 'woe-worth the bird thee bare;
The man, the knife, and all that made thee, woe be to their share :
Woe-worth the time and place where I so could indite ;
And woe be it yet once again, the pen that so can write.
Unhappy hand ! it had been happy time for me,
If when to write thou learned first, unjointed hadst thou be.'
Thus cursed he himself, and every other wight,
Save her alone whom love him bound to serve both day and night.
Which when I heard, and saw how he himself fordid ;1
Against the ground with bloody strokes, himself e'en there to rid ;
Had been my heart of flint, it must have melted tho' ;
For in my life I never saw a man so full of woe.
With tears for his redress I rashly to him ran,
And in my arms I caught him fast, and thus I spake him than :
' What woful wight art thou, that in such heavy case
Torments thyself with such despite, here in this desart place ?'
Wherewith as all aghast, fulfill'd with ire and dread,
He cast on me a staring look, with colour pale and dead :
' Nay, what art thou,' quoth he, 'that in this heavy plight
Dost find me here, most woful wretch, that life hath in despite ?'
' I am,' quoth I, 'but poor, and simple in degree ;
A shepherd's charge I have in hand, unworthy though I be.'
With that he gave a sigh, as though the sky should fall,
And loud, alas ! he shrieked oft, and, 'Shepherd,' gan he call,
'Come, hie thee fast at once, and print it in thy heart,
So thou shalt know, and I shall tell thee, guiltless how I smart.'
His back against the tree sore feebled all with faint,
With weary sprite he stretcht him up, and thus he told his plaint :
' Once in my heart,' quoth he, 'it chanced me to love
Such one, in whom hath Nature wrought, her cunning for to prove.
And sure I cannot say, but many years were spent,
With such good will so recompens'd, as both we were content.
Whereto then I me bound, and she likewise also,
The sun should run his course awry, ere we this faith forego.
Who joyed then but I ? who had this worldès bliss ?
Who might compare a life to mine, that never thought on this ?
But dwelling in this truth, amid my greatest joy,
Is me befallen a greater loss than Priam had of Troy.
She is reversed clean, and beareth me in hand,
That my deserts have given cause to break this faithful band :
And for my just excuse availeth no defence.
Now knowest thou all ; I can no more ; but, Shepherd, hie thee hence,
And give him leave to die, that may no longer live :
Whose record, lo ! I claim to have, my death I do forgive.
And eke when I am gone, be bold to speak it plain,
Thou hast seen die the truest man that ever love did pain.'
Wherewith he turned him round, and gasping oft for breath,
Into his arms a tree he raught, and said : 'Welcome my death !
Welcome a thousand fold, now dearer unto me
Than should, without her love to live, an emperor to be.'
Thus in this woful state he yielded up the ghost ;
And little knoweth his lady, what a lover she hath lost.
Whose death when I beheld, no marvel was it, right
For pity though my heart did bleed, to see so piteous sight.
My blood from heat to cold oft changed wonders sore ;
A thousand troubles there I found I never knew before ;
'Tween dread and dolour so my sprites were brought in fear,
That long it was ere I could call to mind what I did there.
But as each thing hath end, so had these pains of mine :
The furies past, and I my wits restor'd by length of time.
Then as I could devise, to seek I thought it best
Where I might find some worthy place for such a corse to rest.
And in my mind it came, from thence not far away,
Where Cressid's love, king Priam's son, the worthy Troilus lay.
By him I made his tomb, in token he was true,
And as to him belonged well, I covered it with blue.
Whose soul by angels' power departed not so soon,
But to the heavens, lo ! it fled, for to receive his doom