Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. II. The Seventeenth Century: Ben Jonson to Dryden
John Fletcher (15791625)The Satyr, I (from The Faithful Shepherdess)
H
Is the learned poet’s good;
Sweeter yet did never crown
The head of Bacchus; nuts more brown
Than the squirrel’s teeth that crack them;
Deign, O fairest fair, to take them!
For these black-eyed Dryope
Hath oftentimes commanded me
With my clasped knee to climb:
See how well the lusty time
Hath deck’d their rising cheeks in red,
Such as on your lips is spread.
Here be berries for a queen,
Some be red, some be green;
These are of that luscious meat
The great god Pan himself doth eat:
All these, and what the woods can yield,
The hanging mountain or the field,
I freely offer, and ere long
Will bring you more, more sweet and strong;
Till when, humbly leave I take,
Lest the great Pan do awake,
That sleeping lies in a deep glade,
Under a broad beech’s shade.
I must go, I must run
Swifter than the fiery sun.