Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. II. The Seventeenth Century: Ben Jonson to Dryden

Robert Herrick (1591–1674)

Music

CHARM me asleep, and melt me so

With thy delicious numbers,

That being ravish’d, hence I go

Away in easy slumbers.

Ease my sick head,

And make my bed,

Thou Power that canst sever

From me this ill;—

And quickly still,

Though thou not kill

My fever.

Thou sweetly canst convert the same

From a consuming fire,

Into a gentle-licking flame,

And make it thus expire.

Then make me weep

My pains asleep,

And give me such reposes,

That I, poor I,

May think, thereby,

I live and die

’Mongst roses.

Fall on me like a silent dew,

Or like those maiden showers,

Which, by the peep of day, do strew

A baptism o’er the flowers.

Melt, melt my pains

With thy soft strains;

That having ease me given,

With full delight,

I leave this light,

And take my flight

For Heaven.