Ye wastefull woodes / Edmund Spenser

from The Shepheardes Calender, 1579:

August  [. . . continued from part 1]

[WILLYE.    PERIGOT.    CUDDIE.]

Cud. But tell me, shepherds, should it not yshend
Your roundels fresh to heare a doolefull verse
Of Rosalend, (who knowes not Rosalend?)
That Colin made, ylke can I you rehearse.
Per. Now say it, Cuddie, as thou art a ladde:
With mery thing its good to medle sadde.

Wil. Fayth of my soule, thou shalt ycrouned be
In Colins stede, if thou this song areede:
For never thing on earth so pleaseth me
As him to heare, or matter of his deede.
Cud. Then listneth ech unto my heavy laye,
And tune your pypes as ruthful as ye may.

‘Ye wastefull woodes beare witnesse of my woe,
Wherein my plaints did oftentimes resound:
Ye carelesse byrds are privie to my cryes,
Which in your songs were wont to make a part:
Thou pleasaunt spring hast luld me oft a sleepe,
Whose streames my tricklinge teares did ofte augment.

‘Resort of people doth my greefs augment,
The walled townes do worke my greater woe:
The forest wide is fitter to resound
The hollow echo of my carefull cryes:
I hate the house, since thence my love did part,
Whose waylefull want debarres myne eyes from sleepe.

‘Let stremes of teares supply the place of sleepe:
Let all, that sweete is, voyd: and all that may augment
My doole drawe neare. More meete to wayle my woe
Bene the wild woddes, my sorrowes to resound,
Then bedde, or bowre, both which I fill with cryes,
When I them see so waist, and fynd no part

‘Of pleasure past. Here will I dwell apart
In gastfull grove therefore, till my last sleepe
Doe close mine eyes: so shall I not augment,
With sight of such a chaunge, my restlesse woe.
Helpe me, ye banefull byrds, whose shrieking sound
Ys signe of dreery death, my deadly cryes

‘Most ruthfully to tune. And as my cryes
(Which of my woe cannot bewray least part)
You heare all night, when nature craveth sleepe,
Increase, so let your yrksome yells augment.
Thus all the night in plaints, the daye in woe
I vowed have to wayst, till safe and sound

‘She home returne, whose voyces silver sound
To cheerefull songs can chaunge my cherelesse cryes.
Hence with the nightingale will I take part,
That blessed byrd, that spends her time of sleepe
In songs and plaintive pleas, the more taugment
The memory of hys misdeede, that bred her woe.

‘And you that feele no woe, / when as the sound
Of these my nightly cryes / ye heare apart,
Let breake your sounder sleepe / and pitie augment.’


Per. O Colin, Colin, the shepheards joye,
How I admire ech turning of thy verse!
And Cuddie, fresh Cuddie, the liefest boye,
How dolefully his doole thou didst re-hearse!
Cud. Then blowe your pypes, shepheards, til you be at home:
The night nigheth fast, yts time to be gone.

~~
Edmund Spenser (1552-1599)
from Complete Poetical Works, 1908

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

[September]

Edmund Spenser biography

To Tame the Kingdoms Let His Angels Run / AE Reiff

To Tame the Kingdoms Let His Angels Run

Lift up your eyes and look unto the hills,

God’s glory is declarèd from the heaven,

He warms the earth as though the living sun

That causes plants to grow and rivers run

From Him had sprung. The meadow and green tree

Lift up a branch and all in praise of Thee.

Man he created sovereign under heaven

To joy him in the light-renewing sun,

There in his veins the dancing rivers run,

But he’s as much a mine as he’s a tree

That lifts a branch and sings his praise of Thee

Who lit the dawn and raised the blooming hills.

There was an angel standing in the sun

Amid the solar flare where rivers run

Who sang, the heaven’s a plant, celestial tree

With garnished fruit that stems its praise of Thee.

When stars are trees, then galaxies are hills,

Where poets dream embodied still of heaven.

All through the night earth’s springs and rivers run

While orchards rest in fields, the apple tree

Outgrows from earth between us, me and thee.

And if clouds sink upon the summer hills,

Surround our infancy under the heaven,

Then as we grow clouds part, outshines the sun.

Is it man or heaven, the springing tree

Whose green boughs so transpire their love of thee?

All praise the growth that lies upon the hills.

Stand on your feet you men, look at the heaven,

Redemption near, he comes with light, the son

To tame the kingdoms let his angels run.

Heaven, earth, man, tree, praise the living God, thee,

Who wrought salvation, light and life upon the hills.

Rejoice you lands, he comes, the king of heaven

Whose glory so outshines the lowering sun

That spinning globe that round him ever runs

Will cease and root in his eternal tree.

~~

AE Reiff, 2021

[All rights reserved by the author - Used with permission]

AE Reiff biography

A Sestina of Memories / J.E. Ball

A Sestina of Memories

When you were nine, and I was six years old,
Do you remember how we wandered forth,
Two small explorers, through the summer fields,
With apple turnovers provisioned well,
And trampled down the farmer's mowing grass,
In haste to pluck the little red-stemmed rose?

And how the farmer in his fury rose
With hot red face, as ogres wore of old,
And eyeing angrily his battered grass,
With wingèd words he drove the culprits forth,
And swore a whipping would be theirs as well
The next time they profaned his sacred fields?

Regretfully we left those sunny fields
(For there alone it grew, our longed-for rose),
And sate us down beside a little well
That bubbled up ’midst stonework grey and old,
And watched the slow soft runlets spouting forth,
To lose themselves amidst the spongy grass.

Long time we lay upon the kindly grass,
Until the cows from out their distant fields
In solemn, slow procession issued forth.
With stiff and lagging movements then we rose,
Our little bones aweary felt, and old
(For all the ground was damp beside the well).

Long weary weeks passed by ere we were well:
Long aching weeks; by then the farmer’s grass
Had turned to hay, and our offence was old.
Again we entered those forbidden fields,
But found no more our creamy-petalled rose,
Thorns, only thorns, the straggling hedge brought forth.

Sadly we turned, and sadly trotted forth,
Our flowers were gone, and all our hopes as well;
Though some, consoling, said, “Your little rose
Will bloom again: and, not to hurt the grass,
You might go skirting round the farmer’s fields –
His hand is mortal heavy, though he’s old.”

Still to the sunlit fields Hope speeds us forth:
Prone on the grass, we dream that all is well:
And so wax old, and never grasp our rose.

---
J.E. Ball
1904
from The Westminster Problems Book, 1908.

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]