Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry.
Volume VI. Fancy. 1904. | | | | Poems of Fancy: II. Fairies: Elves: Sprites | | Compliment to Queen Elizabeth | | William Shakespeare (1564–1616) |
| | From “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” Act II. Sc. 1. |
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OBERON.—My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou remember’st | |
| Since once I sat upon a promontory, | |
| And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin’s back, | |
| Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath, | |
| That the rude sea grew civil at her song, | 5 |
| And certain stars shot madly from their spheres, | |
To hear the sea-maid’s music.
PUCK.— I remember. | |
| OBERON.—That very time I saw (but thou couldst not), | |
| Flying between the cold moon and the earth, | |
| Cupid all armed: a certain aim he took | 10 |
| At a fair vestal thronèd by the west, | |
| And loosed his love-shaft smartly from his bow, | |
| As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts: | |
| But I might see young Cupid’s fiery shaft | |
| Quenched in the chaste beams of the watery moon, | 15 |
| And the imperial votaress passed on, | |
| In maiden meditation, fancy free. | |
| Yet marked I where the bolt of Cupid fell: | |
| It fell upon a little western flower | |
| Before milk-white, now purple with love’s wound, | 20 |
| And maidens call it Love-in-idleness. | |
| Fetch me that flower. | | | |
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