Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.
Andrew Marvell. 16211678356. A Garden Written after the Civil Wars
SEE how the flowers, as at parade, | |
Under their colours stand display’d: | |
Each regiment in order grows, | |
That of the tulip, pink, and rose. | |
But when the vigilant patrol | 5 |
Of stars walks round about the pole, | |
Their leaves, that to the stalks are curl’d, | |
Seem to their staves the ensigns furl’d. | |
Then in some flower’s belovèd hut | |
Each bee, as sentinel, is shut, | 10 |
And sleeps so too; but if once stirr’d, | |
She runs you through, nor asks the word. | |
O thou, that dear and happy Isle, | |
The garden of the world erewhile, | |
Thou Paradise of the four seas | 15 |
Which Heaven planted us to please, | |
But, to exclude the world, did guard | |
With wat’ry if not flaming sword; | |
What luckless apple did we taste | |
To make us mortal and thee waste! | 20 |
Unhappy! shall we never more | |
That sweet militia restore, | |
When gardens only had their towers, | |
And all the garrisons were flowers; | |
When roses only arms might bear, | 25 |
And men did rosy garlands wear? |