Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, MASQUE AT THE MARRIAGE OF THE LORD HAYES: SONG. NIGHT, by THOMAS CAMPION


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

MASQUE AT THE MARRIAGE OF THE LORD HAYES: SONG. NIGHT, by                 Poet's Biography
First Line: Vanish, dark veils! Let night in glory shine
Last Line: And at her stormy words their boughs shall break.


Vanish, dark veils! let night in glory shine
As she doth burn in rage: come leave our shrine
You black-haired Hours, and guide us with your lights,
Flora hath wakened wide our drowsy sprites:
See where she triumphs, see her flowers are thrown,
And all about the seeds of malice sown!
Despiteful Flora, is't not enough of grief
That Cynthia's robbed, but thou must grace the thief?
Or didst not hear Night's sovereign Queen complain
Hymen had stolen a Nymph out of her train,
And matched her here, plighted henceforth to be
Love's friend, and stranger to virginity?
And makest thou sport for this?
Flora. Be mild, stern Night;
Flora doth honour Cynthia, and her right.
Virginity is a voluntary power,
Free from constraint, even like an untouched flower
Meet to be gathered when 'tis throughly blown.
The Nymph was Cynthia's while she was her own,
But now another claims in her a right,
By fate reserved thereto and wise foresight.
Zeph. Can Cynthia one kind virgin's loss bemoan?
How if perhaps she brings her ten for one?
Or can she miss one in so full a train?
Your Goddess doth of too much store complain.
If all her Nymphs would ask advice of me
There should be fewer virgins than there be.
Nature ordained not men to live alone,
Where there are two a woman should be one.
Night. Thou breath'st sweet poison, wanton Zephyrus,
But Cynthia must not be deluded thus.
Her holy forests are by thieves profaned,
Her virgins frighted, and lo, where they stand
That late were Phœbus' knights, turned now to trees
By Cynthia's vengement for their injuries
In seeking to seduce her nymphs with love:
Here they are fixed, and never may remove
But by Diana's power that stuck them here.
Apollo's love to them doth yet appear,
In that his beams hath gilt them as they grow,
To make their misery yield the greater show.
But they shall tremble when sad Night doth speak,
And at her stormy words their boughs shall break.





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