Robert Herrick (1591-1674)
To Live Merrily, and to Trust to Good Verses
1Now is the time for mirth,
2 Nor cheek or tongue be dumb;
3For with the flow'ry earth
4 The golden pomp is come.
5The golden pomp is come;
6 For now each tree does wear,
7Made of her pap and gum,
8 Rich beads of amber here.
9Now reigns the rose, and now
10 Th' Arabian dew besmears
11My uncontrolled brow
12 And my retorted hairs.
13Homer, this health to thee,
14 In sack of such a kind
15That it would make thee see
16 Though thou wert ne'er so blind.
17Next, Virgil I'll call forth
18 To pledge this second health
19In wine, whose each cup's worth
20 An Indian commonwealth.
21A goblet next I'll drink
23Made he the pledge, he'd think
24 The world had all one nose.
25Then this immensive cup
26 Of aromatic wine,
27Catullus, I quaff up
28 To that terse muse of thine.
29Wild I am now with heat;
30 O Bacchus! cool thy rays!
31Or frantic, I shall eat
32 Thy thyrse, and bite the bays.
33Round, round the roof does run;
34 And being ravish'd thus,
35Come, I will drink a tun
36 To my Propertius.
37Now, to Tibullus, next,
38 This flood I drink to thee;
39But stay, I see a text
40 That this presents to me.
41Behold, Tibullus lies
42 Here burnt, whose small return
43Of ashes scarce suffice
44 To fill a little urn.
45Trust to good verses then;
46 They only will aspire,
47When pyramids, as men,
48 Are lost i' th' funeral fire.
49And when all bodies meet,
50 In Lethe to be drown'd,
51Then only numbers sweet
52 With endless life are crown'd.
Notes
22 ff.] Ovid, Catullus, Propertius, and Tibullus were Latin poets of the first century B.C.
24] one nose: pun on Ovid's name Publius Ovidius Naso.
Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.
Original text: Robert Herrick, Hesperides (London: for John Williams and F. Eglesfield to be sold by Thomas Hunt, 1648), of which a section called "His Noble Numbers: or, his Pious Pieces" has a separate title-page dated 1647. Facs. edn. Menston: Scolar, 1969. PR 3512 H4 1648A ROBA
First publication date:
1648
RPO poem editor: N. J. Endicott
RP edition: 3RP 1.199-200.
Recent editing: 4:2002/2/6
Form: Trimeter Quatrains
Rhyme: abab
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