Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, SONG OF THE STYGIAN NAIADES, by THOMAS LOVELL BEDDOES


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

SONG OF THE STYGIAN NAIADES, by                 Poet's Biography
First Line: Proserpine may pull her flowers
Last Line: Cupid, love, and fie for shame.
Subject(s): Persephone; Proserpine; Proserpina


Proserpine may pull her flowers,
Wet with dew or wet with tears,
Red with anger, pale with fears,
Is it any fault of ours,
If Pluto be an amorous king,
And comes home nightly, laden,
Underneath his broad bat-wing,
With a gentle, mortal maiden?
Is it so? Wind, is it so?
All that you and I do know
Is, that we saw fly and fix
'Mongst the reeds and flowers of Styx,
Yesterday,
Where the Furies made their hay
For a bed of tiger cubs,
A great fly of Beelzebub's,
The bee of hearts, which mortals name
Cupid, Love, and Fie for shame.
Proserpine may weep in rage,
But, ere I and you have done
Kissing, bathing in the sun,
What I have in yonder cage,
Bird or serpent, wild or tame,
She shall guess and ask in vain;
But, if Pluto does't again,
It shall sing out loud his shame.
What hast caught then? What hast caught?
Nothing but a poet's thought,
Which so light did fall and fix
'Mongst the reeds and flowers of Styx,
Yesterday,
Where the Furies made their hay
For a bed of tiger cubs, --
A great fly of Beelzebub's,
The bee of hearts, which mortals name
Cupid, Love, and Fie for shame.








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