Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, CUPID UNGODDED, by JAMES SHIRLEY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

CUPID UNGODDED, by             Poem Explanation     Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Why how now, cupid, grown so wild?
Last Line: To see thy shame, and break thy heart.
Subject(s): Cupid; Eros


Why how now, Cupid, grown so wild?
So great a tyrant, and a child?
What wert thou but an empty shade,
Until our superstition made
Thee first a god, blind, young, to be
A soft and harmless deity?
Our fancy gave that rich pair
Of wings, to wanton in the air;
Thy gaudy quiver, and thy bow,
And golden shafts we did bestow,
But for no other exercise
Than to kill bees, or butterflies.
But since thou hast employed thy darts
Only to wound thy makers' hearts,
And that thy wings serve but to fly
From lovers, when they bleeding die;
Thy blindness used but to invite
Our pity, till we lose our sight;
Thy weakness, not through want of years,
But from the surfeit of our tears;
Stoop to the justice of thy fate, --
We can unmake, that did create.
And first give back, ingrateful thing,
To us, that made, thy glorious wing:
Those painted feathers thou shalt find
Contemned, and tossed by every wind,
Till wandering in some night, they are
The mark of a prodigious star,
And blasted: these the world shall name
The spotted wings of evil fame.
Next, give thy arrows back, which we
Did mean for love, not cruelty.
That rich enamelled bow is mine;
Come, that gay quiver too resign,
And shining belt: these will I burn,
And keep their ashes in some urn,
Till opened on that solemn day
When men to souls sad requiems pay;
Lovers shall curse, and sigh, and make
A new litany for thy sake.
But thou art still alive; and be;
To murder, were to pity thee.
Know, wretch, thou shalt not die, before
I see thee begging at some door!
And, taken for a vagrant, stript,
Then by a furious beedle whipt,
No more with roses, but with thorn:
To all this world thus made a scorn;
I'll give thee eyes, before we part,
To see thy shame, and break thy heart.





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