Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, TO HERRICK - A HANDFUL OF HERBS, by LILLIAN BARNES LONG


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TO HERRICK - A HANDFUL OF HERBS, by                    
First Line: From rue and mint and rosemary
Last Line: Dear rue, and dearest rosemary.
Subject(s): Herrick, Robert (1591-1674); Poetry & Poets; Wellesley College


"Here's rosemary -- that's for remembrance."

FROM rue and mint and rosemary
And all the various sweets that be
More fragrant made by memory --
By memory, yet not my own,
Of waysides that my feet have known,
Of gardens that my hands have sown;
By memory, yet not my own,
That rises in me -- freak or whim
Of homesick heart for hedgerow trim,
And briony copse, and hawthorned lane,
And English Mays that round again,
Year after year, while years remain,
Year after year, -- though not for those --
O, English hearts! -- who sang the Rose --
Two centuries heaped by New World snows --
Two centuries dust -- who yet to me
This largess left of legacy:
England to love, English to be.
Even so, from meads of English dew
That never from my childhood grew,
Yet peeped my childish primers through, --
From rosemary and mint and rue,
I pluck these measures, tie, and send
Them wheresoever you may wend,
My Herrick, gay and gentle friend,
And grave and gentle, being one
Whose like I shall not look upon
While the years wait, while the years run, --
And sending, call (lest in your ear
Such measures sounding, strike the fear
Of poesy laid upon her bier)
On Saint Elizabeth to be
Chief patron saint, and bid you see
Distich nor hemistich of me,
But only rue, mint, rosemary --
Dear rue, and dearest rosemary.





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