Classic Poem

As that Arabian bird (whom all admire)
Her exequies prepared and funeral fire,
Burnt in a flame conceived from the sun,
And nourished with slips of cinnamon,
Out of her ashes hath a second birth,
And flies abroad, a wonderment on earth:
So from the ruins of this mangled creature
Arose so fair and so divine a feature,
That Envy for her heart would dote upon her;
Heaven could not choose but be enamoured on her:
Were I a star, and she a second sphere,
I'd leave the other, and be fixed there.
Had fair Arachne wrought this maiden's hair,
When she with Pallas did for skill compare,
Minerva's work had never been esteemed,
But this had been more rare and highly deemed;
Yet gladly now she would reverse her doom,
Weaving this hair within a spider's loom.
Upon her forehead, as in glory, sat
Mercy and Majesty, for wondering at,
As pure and simple as Albania's snow,
Or milk-white swans which stem the streams of Po:
Like to some goodly foreland, bearing out
Her hair, the tufts which fringed the shore about.
And lest the man which sought those coasts might slip,
Her eyes like stars did serve to guide the ship.
Upon her front (heaven's fairest promontory)
Delineated was the authentic story
Of those elect, whose sheep at first began
To nibble by the springs of Canaan:
Out of whose sacred loins (brought by the stem
Of that sweet singer of Jerusalem)
Came the best Shepherd ever flocks did keep,
Who yielded up his life to save his sheep.
O thou Eternel by whom all beings move,
Giving the springs beneath, and springs above;
Whose finger doth this universe sustain,
Bringing the former and the latter rain;
Who dost with plenty meads and pastures fill,
By drops distilled like dew on Hermon hill:
Pardon a silly swain, who (far unable
In that which is so rare, so admirable)
Dares on an oaten pipe thus meanly sing
Her praise immense, worthy a silver string.
And thou which through the desert and the deep,
Didst lead thy chosen like a flock of sheep:
As sometime by a star thou guided'st them,
Which fed upon the plains of Bethlehem;
So by thy sacred Spirit direct my quill,
When I shall sing ought of thy holy hill,
That times to come, when they my rhymes rehearse,
May wonder at me, and admire my verse:
For who but one rapt in celestial fire,
Can by his Muse to such a pitch aspire,
That from aloft he might behold and tell
Her worth, whereon an iron pen might dwell?
When she was born, Nature in sport began
To learn the cunning of an artisan,
And did vermilion with a white compose,
To mock herself and paint a damask rose.
But scorning Nature unto Art should seek,
She spilt her colours on this maiden's cheek.
Her mouth the gate from whence all goodness came,
Of power to give the dead a living name.
Her words embalmed in so sweet a breath,
That made them triumph both on Time and Death;
Whose fragrant sweets, since the chameleon knew,
And tasted of, he to this humour grew,
Let other elements, held this so rare,
That since he never feeds on ought but air.