A Solitary Discourse | Elemental Edition

How canst thou heavy be? Now she appears,
My pensive soul, that with her luster cheers
All drooping spirits; lift up thy sad eyes,
Behold how horrid darkness from her flies.
Do thou but look how at the sight of day
With sable wings she2
, scowling, flies away.
Look how Aurora3
 with her orient light
Doth scorn and trample melancholy Night!
Nay, pale-faced Cynthia4
 with her glitt’ring train
Hides all away for fear of her disdain.
But yet (alas) what comfort’s5
 in this light
That is alternately pursued by Night?
Instead of bringing of my soul relief,
It doth successively6
 renew my grief.
There is no cheerful light below the skies,
Nor can we see it till we lose our eyes.
Did I not hope my soul’s of heavenly birth?
Let me be nothing if I debreathe on Earth7
;
But on condition of eternal glory,
I am contented with my life’s sad story.
For shame, my soul! Leave  this base discontent,
And cheerly8
 look up to the firmament.
See how Aurora sprinkles dew-like pearls
On Ceres’s9
 corn, gathered by rural girls
To wash the freckles from their lovely face,
That in their lovers’ eyes they may find grace.
Alas, what beauty with such care up-nursed10
,
When Sickness, Age, and Grief (of all the worst)
Have acted all their parts? Then comes pale Death
And closes up their eyes and stops their breath.
How empty and how vain is carnal love
Compared but with a glimpse of joys above!
I was in youth a modest virgin bred11
And brought with honor to my nuptial bed,
To a most lovely youth and nobly born;
Virtue and beauty did his youth adorn.
Our music then had sweet and pleasant closes12
,
Crowned were our heads with myrtle13
 and with roses,
Which to this hour are flowery, fresh, and green,
Though cypress buds14
 were here and there between
Stuck in by adverse fate to cool our love,
Or else that15
 we should place our thoughts above,
Where only is pure, true love and lasting peace.
That love shall last when faith and hope shall cease.
From heaven, my soul (from heaven), thy comfort springs,
For earth (alas) nought but affliction brings.
Look up once more; here’s that16
 thy heart will ease,
Or surely nothing will thy fancy please.
Mark how Apollo17
 this salubrious18
 morning,
With dazzling beams his splendent face adorning,
Comes glitt’ring forth in most refulgent19
 grace,
Joying to run his occidental20
race21
,
Scorning his eyes should take a slumbering nap
Until he lays in wanton Thetis’s22
 lap
His flagrant23
 head; then she, in love, belaves24
His burning tresses with her cooler waves;
And that sweet dew on flowers redolent25
,
Which breathes to us an aromatic scent,
He with his heat exhales above our view,
Which doth nocturnally descend in dew.
See how the solsequium26
 thrusts her head
Up through the center from that common bed
Into the liquid azure27
 sea above her
To follow Phoebus28
, her admiréd lover;
When he in our horizon gives his race29
,
Then in the air she shows her lovely face.
So when he is our zenith at midday,
She at full length her beauty doth display;
But when the sun is nadir30
 to us here,
She meets him in the other hemisphere.
To see these marvels and this shining lamp
Dazzles mine eyes and doth my spirit damp;
For when I do his orient31
 splendor see,
It more discovers32
 my deformity.
If I but look upon his blazing beauty,
He burns me black for failing so in duty.
But if, in innocence33
, I had stood upright,
Nor sun, nor moon should hurt me day or night,
But I (ay me) in Adam fell from glory,
Which makes me live a life most transitory.
Then34
, those celestial orbs that shine so bright
Should fellows be and further our delight.
Happy should be their influence and dances,
Both their full-eyed35
aspects36
 and secret glances.
Then, unto37
 them I should be independent,
Nor need I fear, though Saturn’s my ascendant38
;
But now I’m troubled, ready still to cry,
’Cause at my birth some planet looked awry,
Forgetting Him that them and me did make,
Who of His children constant care doth take;
And those celestial works of wonder,
He knows their names, natures, and number,
Their turning and their constant stations,
And every influence of those constellations.
In God, my soul, trust ever and depend,
So shalt thou live a life that ne’er shall end.
Nor be thou hopeless when thy body’s crumbled,
And with all creatures in this mass is jumbled;
But at thy death sing cheerfully a requiem39
For thou with joy shall, like the solsequium,
Meet thy redeemer in a horoscope40
Brighter than this; thy flesh shall rest in hope,
And thou shalt see thy Savior with these eyes,
When that bright sun of righteousness41
 shall rise;
With healing wings He shall, from my sad eyes
And from all faces else, wipe off the tears;
So from all hearts he will dispel all fears.
O then (till then) send grace42
 into my heart,
Which from my throbbing bosom ne’er shall part;
But I’ll improve’t, my43
 few and evil days,
Until it doth exhale44
 in thanks and praise.

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