| LET the bird of loudest lay | |
| On the sole Arabian tree, | |
| Herald sad and trumpet be, | |
| To whose sound chaste wings obey. | |
| |
| But thou shrieking harbinger, | 5 |
| Foul precurrer of the fiend, | |
| Augur of the fever's end, | |
| To this troop come thou not near. | |
| |
| From this session interdict | |
| Every fowl of tyrant wing | 10 |
| Save the eagle, feather'd king: | |
| Keep the obsequy so strict. | |
| |
| Let the priest in surplice white | |
| That defunctive music can, | |
| Be the death-divining swan, | 15 |
| Lest the requiem lack his right. | |
| |
| And thou, treble-dated crow, | |
| That thy sable gender mak'st | |
| With the breath thou giv'st and tak'st, | |
| 'Mongst our mourners shalt thou go. | 20 |
| |
| Here the anthem doth commence:— | |
| Love and constancy is dead; | |
| Phoenix and the turtle fled | |
| In a mutual flame from hence. | |
| |
| So they loved, as love in twain | 25 |
| Had the essence but in one; | |
| Two distincts, division none; | |
| Number there in love was slain. | |
| |
| Hearts remote, yet not asunder; | |
| Distance, and no space was seen | 30 |
| 'Twixt the turtle and his queen: | |
| But in them it were a wonder. | |
| |
| So between them love did shine, | |
| That the turtle saw his right | |
| Flaming in the phoenix' sight; | 35 |
| Either was the other's mine. | |
| |
| Property was thus appall'd, | |
| That the self was not the same; | |
| Single nature's double name | |
| Neither two nor one was call'd. | 40 |
| |
| Reason, in itself confounded, | |
| Saw division grow together; | |
| To themselves yet either neither; | |
| Simple were so well compounded, | |
| |
| That it cried, 'How true a twain | 45 |
| Seemeth this concordant one! | |
| Love hath reason, reason none | |
| If what parts can so remain.' | |
| |
| Whereupon it made this threne | |
| To the phoenix and the dove, | 50 |
| Co-supremes and stars of love, | |
| As chorus to their tragic scene. | |
| |
THRENOS
BEAUTY, truth, and rarity, | |
| Grace in all simplicity, | |
| Here enclosed in cinders lie. | 55 |
| |
| Death is now the phoenix' nest; | |
| And the turtle's loyal breast | |
| To eternity doth rest, | |
| |
| Leaving no posterity: | |
| 'Twas not their infirmity, | 60 |
| It was married chastity. | |
| |
| Truth may seem, but cannot be; | |
| Beauty brag, but 'tis not she; | |
| Truth and beauty buried be. | |
| |
| To this urn let those repair | 65 |
| That are either true or fair; | |
| For these dead birds sigh a prayer. | |
