Classic Poem

Venus, by Adonis' side,
Crying kissed, and kissing cried,
Wrung her hands and tore her hair
For Adonis dying there.

‘Stay!’ quoth she, ‘Oh, stay and live!
Nature surely doth not give
To the earth her sweetest flowers,
To be seen but some few hours.

On his face, still as he bled,
For each drop, a tear she shed,
Which she kissed, or wiped, away,
Else had drowned him where he lay.

‘Fair Proserpina,’ quoth she,
‘Shall not have thee yet from me;
Nor thy soul to fly begin,
While my lips can keep it in.’

Here she ceased again. And some
Say Apollo would have come
To have cured his wounded limb,
But that she had smothered him.