Lines On Reading Too Many Poets

Roses, rooted warm in earth

Bud in rhyme, another age

Lilies know a ghostly birth

Strewn along a patterned page

Golden lad and chimbley sweep

Die; and so their song shall keep



Wind that in Arcadia starts

In and out a couplet plays

And the drums of bitter hearts

Beat the measure of a phrase

Sweets and woes but come to print

Quae cum ita sint