Aprill / Edmund Spenser (1)

from The Shepheardes Calender, 1579:

Aprill.  Æglogia Quarta. 

ARGUMENT. This Æglogue is purposely intended to the honor and prayse of our most gracious sovereigne, Queene Elizabeth. The speakers herein be Hobbinoll and Thenott, two shepheardes: the which Hobbinoll, being before mentioned greatly to have loved Colin, is here set forth more largely, complayning him of that boyes great misadventure in love, whereby his mynd was alienate and withdrawen not onely from him, who moste loved him, but also from all former delightes and studies, aswell in pleasaunt pyping as conning ryming and singing, and other his laudable exercises. Whereby he taketh occasion, for proofe of his more excellencie and skill in poetrie, to recorde a songe which the sayd Colin sometime made in honor of her Majestie, whom abruptely he termeth Elysa.

THENOT. HOBBINOLL.

The. Tell me, good Hobbinoll, what garres thee greete?
        What! hath some wolfe thy tender lambes ytorne?
Or is thy bagpype broke, that soundes so sweete?
        Or art thou of thy loved lasse forlorne?

Or bene thine eyes attempred to the yeare.
        Quenching the gasping furrowes thirst with rayne?
Like April shoure, so stremes the trickling teares
        Adowne thy cheeke, to quenche thy thristye payne.

Hob. Nor thys, nor that, so muche doeth make me mourne,
        But for the ladde whome long I lovd so deare
Nowe loves a lasse that all his love doth scorne:
        He, plongd in payne, his tressed locks dooth teare.

Shepheards delights he dooth them all forsweare,
        Hys pleasaunt pipe, whych made us meriment,
He wylfully hath broke, and doth forbeare
        His wonted songs, wherein he all outwent.

The. What is he for a ladde you so lament?
        Ys love such pinching payne to them that prove?
And hath he skill to make so excellent,
        Yet hath so little skill to brydle love?

Hob. Colin thou kenst, the southerne shepheardes boye:
        Him Love hath wounded with a deadly darte.
Whilome on him was all my care and joye,
        Forcing with gyfts to winne his wanton heart.

But now from me hys madding mynd is starte,
        And woes the widdowes daughter of the glenne:
So nowe fayre Rosalind hath bredde hys smart,
        So now his frend is chaunged for a frenne.

The. But if hys ditties bene so trimly dight,
        I pray thee, Hobbinoll, recorde some one,
The whiles our flockes doe graze about in sight,
        And we close shrowded in thys shade alone.

Hob. Contented I: then will I singe his laye
        Of fayre Elisa, queene of shepheardes all;
Which once he made, as by a spring he laye,
        And tuned it unto the waters fall.

[continued in part 2 . . .]

The Laye of Fayre Elisa / Edmund Spenser

from The Shepheardes Calender, 1579:

from Aprill    [. . . continued from part 1]

‘Ye dayntye Nymphs, that in this blessed brooke
        Doe bathe your brest,
Forsake your watry bowres, and hether looke,
        At my request.
And eke you Virgins that on Parnasse dwell,
Whence floweth Helicon, the learned well,
        Helpe me to blaze
        Her worthy praise
Which in her sexe doth all excell.

‘Of fayre Elisa be your silver song,
        That blessed wight:
The flowre of virgins, may shee florish long
        In princely plight.
For shee is Syrinx daughter without spotte,
Which Pan, the shepheards god, of her begot:
        So sprong her grace
        Of heavenly race,
No mortall blemishe may her blotte.

‘See, where she sits upon the grassie greene,
        (O seemely sight!)
Yclad in scarlot, like a mayden queene,
        And ermines white.
Upon her head a cremosin coronet,
With damaske roses and daffadillies set:
        Bayleaves betweene,
        And primroses greene,
Embellish the sweete violet.

‘Tell me, have ye seene her angelick face,
        Like Phœbe fayre?
Her heavenly haveour, her princely grace,
        Can you well compare?
The redde rose medled with the white yfere,
In either cheeke depeincten lively chere.
        Her modest eye,
        Her majestie,
Where have you seene the like, but there?

‘I sawe Phœbus thrust out his golden hedde,
        Upon her to gaze:
But when he sawe how broade her beames did spredde,        
        It did him amaze.
He blusht to see another sunne belowe,
Ne durst againe his fyrye face out showe:
        Let him, if he dare,
        His brightnesse compare
With hers, to have the overthrowe.

‘Shewe thy selfe, Cynthia, with thy silver rayes,
        And be not abasht:
When shee the beames of her beauty displayes,
        O how art thou dasht!
But I will not match her with Latonaes seede;
Such follie great sorow to Niobe did breede:
        Now she is a stone,
        And makes dayly mone,
Warning all other to take heede.

‘Pan may be proud, that ever he begot
        Such a bellibone,
And Syrinx rejoyse, that ever was her lot
        To beare such an one.
Soone as my younglings cryen for the dam,
To her will I offer a milkwhite lamb:
        Shee is my goddesse plaine,
        And I her shepherds swayne,
Albee forswonck and forswatt I am.

‘I see Calliope speede her to the place,
        Where my goddesse shines,
And after her the other Muses trace,
        With their violines.
Bene they not bay braunches which they doe beare,
All for Elisa in her hand to weare?
        So sweetely they play,
        And sing all the way,
That it a heaven is to heare.

‘Lo how finely the Graces can it foote
        To the instrument:
They dauncen deffly, and singen soote,
        In their meriment.
Wants not a fourth Grace, to make the daunce even?
Let that rowme to my Lady be yeven:
        She shalbe a Grace,
        To fyll the fourth place,
And reigne with the rest in heaven.

‘And whither rennes this bevie of ladies bright,
        Raunged in a rowe?
They bene all Ladyes of the Lake behight,
        That unto her goe.
Chloris, that is the chiefest nymph of al,
Of olive braunches beares a coronall:
        Olives bene for peace,
        When wars doe surcease:
Such for a princesse bene principall.

‘Ye shepheards daughters, that dwell on the greene,
        Hye you there apace:
Let none come there, but that virgins bene,
        To adorne her grace.
And when you come whereas shee is in place,
See that your rudenesse doe not you disgrace:
        Binde your fillets faste,
        And gird in your waste,
For more finesse, with a tawdrie lace.

‘Bring hether the pincke and purple cullambine,
        With gelliflowres;
Bring coronations, and sops in wine,
        Worne of paramoures;
Strowe me the ground with daffadowndillies,
And cowslips, and kingcups, and loved lillies:
        The pretie pawnce,
        And the chevisaunce,
Shall match with the fayre flowre delice.

‘Now ryse up, Elisa, decked as thou art,
        In royall aray;
And now ye daintie damsells may depart
        Echeone her way.
I feare I have troubled your troupes to longe:
Let Dame Eliza thanke you for her song:
        And if you come hether
        When damsines I gether,
I will part them all you among.’


[Thenot] And was thilk same song of Colins owne making?
        Ah, foolish boy, that is with love yblent!
Great pittie is, he be in such taking,
        For naught caren, that bene so lewdly bent.

[Hobbinol] Sicker, I hold him for a greater fon,
        That loves the thing he cannot purchase.
But let us homeward, for night draweth on,
        And twincling starres the daylight hence chase.

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

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

[Maye]

Edmund Spenser biography

April's featured poem

The Penny Blog's featured poem for April 2022:

Spring, by Edna St. Vincent Millay

https://gdancesbetty.blogspot.com/2012/04/spring-millay.html

Penny's Top 20 / March 2022

            

Penny's Top 20

The most-visited poems on  The Penny Blog in March 2022:

  1.  There Is No Cold in Christ, AE Reiff

  2.  Skating, William Wordsworth

  3.  Esthetique du Mal, Wallace Stevens

  4.  March, Rebecca Hey

  5.  J.B. Corot, John Payne
  6.  March, A.E. Housman
  7.  Beeny Cliff, Thomas Hardy

  8.  March, Mary Mapes Dodge
  9.  To My Sister, William Wordsworth
10.  A Light Exists in Spring, Emily Dickinson

11.  March, Edmond Spenser
12.  Winter Song, Elizabeth Tollet
13.  A Midwinter Night's Eve, George J. Dance
14.  Sunlight, AE Reiff
15.  Poem with Rhythms, Wallace Stevens
16.  Large Red Man Reading, Wallace Stevens 
17.  Card Game, Frank Prewett

18.  To Tame the Kingdoms Let His Angels Run, AE Reiff
19.  Craving for Spring, D.H. Lawrence

20. The Happy Tree, Gerald Gould

Source: Blogger, "Stats"  

March / Rebecca Hey

from The Poetical Calendar

March

Could sullen Winter, in his mid career,
Call from his magazine of storm and cloud
A ruder gale than this? How shrill, how loud,
Its angry dissonance assails the ear!
Where be those tokens now which late did cheer
The trusting heart with hopes that Spring was nigh?
Ah! as I gaze around, earth, sea, and sky,
In mournful cadence, seem to answer "Where?"
Yet wait we patiently a little while —
The boon for which we sigh is but delay'd;
So sure as Nature's summer charms did fade
At Autumn's touch, so sure at Spring's sweet smile
Shall trees again bud forth, and flowers unfold,
"And all be vernal rapture as of old."

~~
Rebecca Hey (1797-1867)

from Recollections of the Lakes, and other poems, 1841

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

[April]

Rebecca Hey bibliography

To My Sister / William Wordsworth

                                            Lines
        written at a small distance from my house, and sent
by my little boy to the person to whom they are addressed.

It is the first mild day of March:
Each minute sweeter than before,
The red-breast sings from the tall larch
That stands beside our door.

There is a blessing in the air,
Which seems a sense of joy to yield
To the bare trees, and mountains bare,
And grass in the green field.

My Sister! (’tis a wish of mine)
Now that our morning meal is done,
Make haste, your morning task resign;
Come forth and feel the sun.

Edward will come with you, and pray,
Put on with speed your woodland dress,
And bring no book, for this one day
We’ll give to idleness.

No joyless forms shall regulate
Our living Calendar:
We from to-day, my friend, will date
The opening of the year.

Love, now an universal birth.
From heart to heart is stealing,
From earth to man, from man to earth,
—It is the hour of feeling.

One moment now may give us more
Than fifty years of reason;
Our minds shall drink at every pore
The spirit of the season.

Some silent laws our hearts may make,
Which they shall long obey;
We for the year to come may take
Our temper from to-day.

And from the blessed power that rolls
About, below, above;
We’ll frame the measure of our souls,
They shall be tuned to love.

Then come, my sister! come, I pray,
With speed put on your woodland dress,
And bring no book; for this one day
We’ll give to idleness.

~~

William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

from Lyrical Ballads, 1798

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

William Wordsworth biography

March / A.E. Housman

X

March

The sun at noon to higher air,
Unharnessing the silver Pair
That late before his chariot swam,
Rides on the gold wool of the Ram.

So braver notes the storm-cock sings
To start the rusted wheel of things,
And brutes in field and brutes in pen
Leap that the world goes round again.

The boys are up the woods with day
To fetch the daffodils away,
And home at noonday from the hills
They bring no dearth of daffodils.

Afield for palms the girls repair,
And sure enough the palms are there,
And each will find by hedge or pond
Her waving silver-tufted wand.

In farm and field through all the shire
The eye beholds the heart's desire;
Ah, let not only mine be vain,
For lovers should be loved again.

~~
A.E. Housman (1859-1936)
from A Shropshire Lad, 1896

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada, the United States, and the European Union]

A.E. Housman biography

"March" read by Richard Mitchley. Courtesy Richard Mitchley - Topic.