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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


A SONG TO AMORET by HENRY VAUGHAN

Poem Explanation Poet Analysis

First Line: IF I WERE DEAD, AND, IN MY PLACE
Last Line: THIS ENDLESS, HOLY FIRE.

If I were dead, and in my place
Some fresher youth designed
To warm thee with new fires, and grace
Those arms I left behind;

Were he as faithful as the sun,
That's wedded to the sphere;
His blood as chaste and temp'rate run,
As April's mildest tear;

Or were he rich, and with his heaps
And spacious share of earth,
Could make divine affection cheap,
And court his golden birth:

For all these arts I'd not believe,
No, though he should be thine—
The mighty amorist could not give
So rich a heart as mine.

Fortune and beauty thou might'st find,
And greater men than I;
But my true resolvéd mind
They never shall come nigh.

For I not for an hour did love,
Or for a day desire,
But with my soul had from above
This endless, holy fire.



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