Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE FIRST MEETING, by EDWARD HERBERT


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE FIRST MEETING, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: As sometimes with a sable cloud
Last Line: Comes from the motions of your mind
Alternate Author Name(s): Cherbury, 1st Baron Herbert Of; Herbert Of Cherbury, Edward Herbert, 1st Baron; Herbert Of Cherbury, Lord
Subject(s): Love - Beginnings


As sometimes with a sable cloud
We see the heavens bow'd,
And dark'ning all the air
Until the lab'ring fires they do contain
Break forth again,
Ev'n so from under your black hair
I saw such an unusual blaze
Light'ning and sparkling from your eyes,
And with unused prodigies
Forcing such [terrors and] amaze,
That I did judge your empire here
Was not of love alone, but fear.

But as all that is violent
Doth by degrees relent,
So when that sweetest face,
Growing at last to be serene and clear,
Did now appear
With all its wonted heav'nly grace,
And your appeased eyes did send
A beam from them so soft and mild
That former terrors were exiled,
And all that could amaze did end;
Darkness in me was chang'd to light,
Wonder to love, love to delight.

Nor here yet did your goodness cease
My heart and eyes to bless,
For being past all hope
That I could now enjoy a better state,
An orient gate
(As if the heav'ns themselves did ope)
First form'd in thee, and then disclos'd
So gracious and sweet a smile,
That my soul, ravished the while,
And wholly from itself unloos'd,
Seem'd hov'ring in your breath to rise,
To feel an air of Paradise.

Nor here yet did your favours end,
For whilst I down did bend,
As one who now did miss
A soul, which, grown much happier than before,
Would turn no more,
You did bestow on me a kiss,
And in that kiss a soul infuse,
Which was so fashion'd by your mind,
And which was so much more refin'd
Than that I formerly did use,
That if one soul found joys in thee,
The other fram'd them new in me.

But as those bodies which dispense
Their beams, in parting hence
Those beams do re-collect,

Until they in themselves resumed have
The forms they gave,
So when your gracious aspect
From me was turned once away,
Neither could I thy soul retain,
Nor you gave mine leave to remain,
To make with you a longer stay,
Or suffer'd aught else to appear
But your hair, night's hemisphere.

Only as we in loadstones find
Virtue of such a kind
That what they once do give,
B'ing neither to be chang'd by any clime
Or forc'd by time,
Doth ever in its subjects live,
So though I be from you retir'd,
The power you gave yet still abides,
And my soul ever so guides,
By your magnetic touch inspir'd,
That all it moves or is inclin'd
Comes from the motions of your mind





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