08 November 2010
On My Deer Hart, er, Dear Heart
3:17 PM | Signed
Kelsea D |
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John Milton, "On Shakespeare"
What needs my Shakespeare for his honored bones
To labor of an age in piled stones,
Or that his hallowed relics should be hid
Under a star-ypointing pyramid?
Dear son of memory, great heir of fame,
What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name?
Thou in our wonder and astonishment
Hast built thyself a livelong monument.
For, whilst, to the shame of slow-endeavouring art
Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart
Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book
Those Delphic lines with deep impression took,
Then thou our fancy of itself bereaving,
Dost make us marble with too much conceiving
,And so sepúlchred in such pomp dost lie
That kings for such a tomb would wish to die.
What needs my Shakespeare for his honored bones
To labor of an age in piled stones,
Or that his hallowed relics should be hid
Under a star-ypointing pyramid?
Dear son of memory, great heir of fame,
What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name?
Thou in our wonder and astonishment
Hast built thyself a livelong monument.
For, whilst, to the shame of slow-endeavouring art
Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart
Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book
Those Delphic lines with deep impression took,
Then thou our fancy of itself bereaving,
Dost make us marble with too much conceiving
,And so sepúlchred in such pomp dost lie
That kings for such a tomb would wish to die.
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2 comments:
What kind of a poem is that? I'm impressed. The meter and the rhyme make it really fun to read out loud.
I'm glad the early talents of Milton were enough for you. The poem is in iambic pentameter--always fun to read out loud.
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