Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TO LUCY, COUNTESS OF BEDFORD by BEN JONSON

Poet Analysis

First Line: MADAM, I TOLD YOU LATE HOW I REPENTED
Last Line: MAKE IT YOUR GIFT. SEE WHITHER THAT WILL BEAR ME.
Subject(s): BEDFORD, LUCY, COUNTESS OF (1581-1627); RUSSELL, LUCY, COUNTESS OF BEDFORD;
Madam, I told you late how I repented,
I asked a lord a buck, and he denied me;
And, ere I could ask you, I was prevented:
For your most noble offer had supplied me.
Straight went I home; and there most like a poet,
I fancied to myself, what wine, what wit
I would have spent: how every muse should know it,
And Phoebus' self should be at eating it.
O madam, if your grant did thus transfer me,
Make it your gift. See whither that will bear me.



Home: PoetryExplorer.net