Whose tongue is music now? What canst thou boast

Of things long since, or anything ensuing?

The flowers are sweet, their colours fresh and trim;

But true sweet beauty lived and died with him.

‘Bonnet nor veil henceforth no creature wear:

Nor sun nor wind will ever strive to kiss you.

Having no fair to lose, you need not fear.

The sun doth scorn you, and the wind doth hiss you.

But when Adonis lived, sun and sharp air

Lurked like two thieves to rob him of his fair;

‘And therefore would he put his bonnet on,

Under whose brim the gaudy sun would peep.

The wind would blow it off, and, being gone,

Play with his locks; then would Adonis weep,

And straight, in pity of his tender years,

They both would strive who first should dry his tears.

‘To see his face the lion walked along

Behind some hedge, because he would not fear him.

To recreate himself when he hath sung,

The tiger would be tame, and gently hear him.

If he had spoke, the wolf would leave his prey,

And never fright the silly lamb that day.

‘When he beheld his shadow in the brook,

The fishes spread on it their golden gills.

When he was by, the birds such pleasure took

That some would sing, some other in their bills

Would bring him mulberries and ripe-red cherries.

He fed them with his sight, they him with berries.

‘But this foul, grim, and urchin-snouted boar,

Whose downward eye still looketh for a grave,

Ne’er saw the beauteous livery that he wore:

Witness the entertainment that he gave:

If he did see his face, why then, I know

He thought to kiss him, and hath killed him so.

“Tis true, ’tis true; thus was Adonis slain;

He ran upon the boar with his sharp spear,

Who did not whet his teeth at him again,

But by a kiss thought to persuade him there,

And, nuzzling in his flank, the loving swine

Sheathed unaware the tusk in his soft groin.

‘Had I been toothed like him, I must confess

With kissing him I should have killed him first;

But he is dead, and never did he bless

My youth with his, the more am I accursed.’

With this she falleth in the place she stood,

And stains her face with his congealed blood.

She looks upon his lips, and they are pale.

She takes him by the hand, and that is cold.

She whispers in his ears a heavy tale,

As if they heard the woeful words she told.

She lifts the coffer-lids that close his eyes,

Where lo, two lamps burnt out in darkness lies;

Two glasses, where herself herself beheld

A thousand times, and now no more reflect,

Their virtue lost, wherein they late excelled,

And every beauty robbed of his effect.

‘Wonder of time,’ quoth she, ‘this is my spite,

That, thou being dead, the day should yet be light.

‘Since thou art dead, lo, here I prophesy

Sorrow on love hereafter shall attend.

It shall be waited on with jealousy,

Find sweet beginning, but unsavoury end;

Ne’er settled equally, but high or low,

That all love’s pleasure shall not match his woe.

‘It shall be fickle, false, and full of fraud,

Bud, and be blasted, in a breathing-while:

The bottom poison, and the top o’erstrawed

With sweets that shall the truest sight beguile.

The strongest body shall it make most weak,

Strike the wise dumb, and teach the fool to speak.

‘It shall be sparing, and too full of riot,

Teaching decrepit age to tread the measures.

The staring ruffian shall it keep in quiet,

Pluck down the rich, enrich the poor with treasures;

It shall be raging-mad, and silly-mild;

Make the young old, the old become a child.

‘It shall suspect where is no cause of fear;

It shall not fear where it should most mistrust.

It shall be merciful, and too severe,

And most deceiving when it seems most just.

Perverse it shall be where it shows most toward,

Put fear to valour, courage to the coward.

‘It shall be cause of war and dire events,

And set dissension ’twixt the son and sire;

Subject and servile to all discontents,

As dry combustious matter is to fire.

Sith in his prime death doth my love destroy,

They that love best their loves shall not enjoy.’

By this, the boy that by her side lay killed

Was melted like a vapour from her sight,

And in his blood that on the ground lay spilled

A purple flower sprung up, chequered with white,

Resembling well his pale cheeks, and the blood

Which in round drops upon their whiteness stood.

She bows her head the new-sprung flower to smell,

Comparing it to her Adonis’ breath,

And says within her bosom it shall dwell,

Since he himself is reft from her by death.

She crops the stalk, and in the breach appears

Green-dropping sap, which she compares to tears.

‘Poor flower,’ quoth she, ‘this was thy father’s guise—

Sweet issue of a more sweet-smelling sire—

For every little grief to wet his eyes.

To grow unto himself was his desire,

And so ’tis thine; but know it is as good

To wither in my breast as in his blood.

‘Here was thy father’s bed, here in my breast.

Thou art the next of blood, and ’tis thy right.

Lo, in this hollow cradle take thy rest;