The Annotated Milton: Complete English Poems (20 page)

And from thence can soar as soon

To the corners
¹⁰⁴⁷
of the moon.

Mortals that would follow me,

Love virtue: she alone is free.

She can teach ye how to climb

Higher than the sphery chime—
¹⁰⁴⁸

Or, if virtue feeble
¹⁰⁴⁹
were,

Heav’n itself would stoop to her.

ON TIME
¹⁰⁵⁰

1633–37?

Fly, envious time, till thou run out thy race!

Call on the lazy leaden-stepping
¹⁰⁵¹
hours,

Whose speed is but the heavy plummet’s
¹⁰⁵²
pace,

And glut thyself with what thy womb
¹⁰⁵³
devours—

Which is no more than what is false and vain

And merely mortal dross.
¹⁰⁵⁴

So little is our loss,

So little is thy gain.

For when as each thing bad thou hast entombed,

And last of all thy greedy self consumed,

Then long eternity shall greet our bliss

With an individual kiss.
¹⁰⁵⁵

And joy shall overtake us as a flood

When everything that is sincerely good

And perfectly divine

With truth, and peace, and love shall ever shine

About the supreme throne

Of Him t’ whose happy-making sight alone,

When once our Heav’nly-guided soul shall climb,

Then all this earthy grossness quit,
¹⁰⁵⁶

Attired with stars we shall forever sit,

Triumphing over death, and chance, and thee, O time!

UPON THE CIRCUMCISION

1633–37

Ye flaming powers
¹⁰⁵⁷
and wingèd warriors bright

That erst with music and triumphant song

First heard by happy watchful shepherd’s ear,

So sweetly sung your joy the clouds along,

Through the soft silence of the list’ning night,

Now mourn, and if sad share with us to bear

Your fiery essence can distill no tear,

Burn in your sighs and borrow

Seas wept from our deep sorrow.

He who with all Heav’n’s heraldry
¹⁰⁵⁸
whilere
¹⁰⁵⁹

Entered the world, now bleeds to give us ease.

Alas, how soon our sin

Sore
¹⁰⁶⁰
doth begin

His infancy to cease!
¹⁰⁶¹

O more exceeding love or law more just?

Just law, indeed—but more exceeding love!

For we, by rightful doom
¹⁰⁶²
remediless,

Were lost in death till He that dwelt above,

High-throned in secret bliss, for us frail dust

Emptied His glory, ev’n to nakedness,

And that great cov’nant
¹⁰⁶³
which we still transgress

Entirely satisfied,

And the full wrath beside

Of vengeful justice bore for our excess,

And seals obedience, first, with wounding smart

This day, but O, ere long

Huge pangs, and strong,

Will pierce more near His heart.

AT A SOLEMN MUSIC

1637

Blest pair of Sirens, pledges of Heav’n’s joy,

Sphere-born, harmonious sisters, voice and verse,

Wed your divine sounds, and mixed power employ,

Dead things with inbreathed sense able to pierce

And to our high-raised fantasy present

That undisturbèd song of pure content
¹⁰⁶⁴

Aye
¹⁰⁶⁵
sung before the sapphire-colored throne

To Him that sits thereon,

With saintly shout and solemn jubilee,

Where the bright Seraphim in burning row

Their loud up-lifted Angel trumpets blow

And the Cherubic host, in thousand choirs,

Touch their golden harps of immortal wires,

With those just Spirits that wear victorious palms

Hymns devout and holy psalms

Singing everlastingly,

That we on earth with undiscording
¹⁰⁶⁶
voice

May rightly answer that melodious noise,

As once we did, till disproportioned sin

Jarred against Nature’s chime and with harsh din

Broke the fair music that all creatures made

To their great Lord, whose love their motion swayed

In perfect diapason,
¹⁰⁶⁷
whilst they stood

In first
¹⁰⁶⁸
obedience and their state of good.

O may we soon again renew that song

And keep in tune with Heav’n, till God ere-long

To His celestial consort
¹⁰⁶⁹
us unite

To live with Him, and sing in endless morn of light.

LYCIDAS
¹⁰⁷⁰

1637

In this monody
¹⁰⁷¹
the author bewails a learnèd friend,
¹⁰⁷²
unfortunately drowned in his passage from Chester [in W. England] on the Irish seas, 1637. And by occasion
¹⁰⁷³
foretells the ruin of our corrupted clergy, then in their height.

Yet once more, O ye laurels,
¹⁰⁷⁴
and once more,

Ye myrtles
¹⁰⁷⁵
brown, with ivy
¹⁰⁷⁶
never sear,
¹⁰⁷⁷

I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude
¹⁰⁷⁸

And with forced
¹⁰⁷⁹
fingers rude
¹⁰⁸⁰

Shatter your leaves before the mellowing
¹⁰⁸¹
year.

Bitter constraint,
¹⁰⁸²
and sad occasion dear,

Compels me to disturb your season due,

For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,

Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer.

Who would not sing for Lycidas? He well knew

Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.

He must not float upon his wat’ry bier

Unwept, and welter
¹⁰⁸³
to the parching
¹⁰⁸⁴
wind,

Without the meed
¹⁰⁸⁵
of some melodious tear.

Begin then, sisters of the sacred well,
¹⁰⁸⁶

That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring,

Begin, and somewhat
¹⁰⁸⁷
loudly sweep the string.

Hence with denial vain, and coy
¹⁰⁸⁸
excuse!

So may
¹⁰⁸⁹
some gentle
¹⁰⁹⁰
muse

With lucky
¹⁰⁹¹
words favor
¹⁰⁹²
my destined
¹⁰⁹³
urn
¹⁰⁹⁴

And, as he passes, turn

And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud.
¹⁰⁹⁵

For we were nursed upon the self-same hill,