Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. II. The Seventeenth Century: Ben Jonson to Dryden
Richard Lovelace (16181658)The Grasshopper
O
Of some well-fillëd oaten beard,
Drunk every night with a delicious tear,
Dropt thee from heaven, where thou wert reared;
That with thy feet and wings dost hop and fly,
And, when thy poppy works, thou dost retire
To thy carved acorn-bed to lie.
Sport’st in the gilt plaits of his beams,
And all these merry days mak’st merry men,
Thyself, and melancholy streams.
Ceres and Bacchus bid good night;
Sharp frosty fingers all your flowers have topped,
And what scythes spared, winds shave off quite.
A genuine summer in each other’s breast,
And spite of this cold time and frozen fate,
Thaw us a warm seat for our rest.
As vestal flames; the North Wind, he
Shall strike his frost-stretched wings, dissolve and fly
This Ætna in epitome.
From the light casements where we play,
And the dark hag from her black mantle strip,
And stick there everlasting day.
That asking nothing, nothing need;
Though lord of all that seas embrace, yet he
That wants himself is poor indeed.