Life

George Herbert 1593 (Montgomery) – 1633 (Bemerton)



I made a posie, while the day ran by:
Here will I smell my remnant out, and tie
My life within this band.
But time did becken to the flowers, and they
By noon most cunningly did steal away
And wither'd in my hand.

My hand was next to them, and then my heart:
I took, without more thinking, in good part
Times gentle admonition:
Who did so sweetly deaths sad taste convey
Making my minde to smell my fatall day;
Yet sugring the suspicion.

Farewell deare flowers, sweetly your time ye spent,
Fit, while ye liv'd, for smell or ornament,
And after death for cures.
I follow straight without complaints or grief,
Since if my sent be good, I care not, if
It be as short as yours.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 29, 2023

39 sec read
84

Quick analysis:

Scheme AABCCB DDECCE XXFXXF
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 678
Words 131
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 6, 6, 6

George Herbert

The Very Reverend Honourable George Herbert was an Anglican priest. more…

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