Classic Poem

Certaine verses written and sent in way of comfort, to her Ladiship.

If those salt showers that your sad eyes haue shed
Haue quencht the flame your griefe hath kindled,
Madame my words shall not be spent in vaine,
To serue for winde to chase that mournfull raine.
Thus farre your losse hath striuen with your griefe,
Whether each piteous eye should deeme the chiefe,
Whiles both your griefe doth make your losse the more,
And your great losse doth cause you grieue so sore.
Both griefe and losse doo willing partners finde,
In euery eye, and euery feeling minde.
So haue I seene the silly Turtle Doue,
The patterne of your griefe and chaster loue,
Sitting vpon a bared bough alone:
Her dearest mates vntimely losse bemone;
Whiles she denies all cares of due repast,
And mourning thus, her weary dayes doth wast.
Thus natures selfe doth teach vs to lament,
And reasons light our sorrowes doth augment.
Yet reason can it selfe this lesson teach,
Our reason should surpasse their sences reach.
Reason our sence, and Grace should reason sway,
That sence and reason both might Grace obay.
Those silly birds whom nature hope denies,
May die for griefe because their fellow dies.
But on this hope our drouping hart should rest,
That maugre death their parted soules are blest.
That their swift course, that Gole doth sooner gaine,
Whereto ere long, our slow steps shall attaine.
Some fewe short yeares your following race shall spend,
Then shall you both meete in a happie end.
But you meane while all in a straunger coast,
Are left alone, as one whose guide is lost.
Madame what ere your grieued thought applies,
We are all Pilgrims to our common skies.
And who is nearest to this home of clay
May find the worser speed and further way.
And as I gesse, vnlesse our Artists faine,
England is nearer heauen of the twaine.
There is your home, where now your Knight doth bide,
Resting by many a Saint and Angels side.
Walke on in Grace, and grieue your selfe no more,
That your so loued mate is gone before.