Great Boast Small Roast.

Of flanks and chines of beef doth Gorrell boast
He has at home; but who tastes boil'd or roast?
Look in his brine-tub, and you shall find there
Two stiff blue pigs'-feet and a sow's cleft ear.

Robert Herrick

Robert Herrick was a 17th-century English lyric poet and cleric. He is known for his book of poems, "Hesperides," which includes the carpe diem poem "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time." His works are noted for their clarity, simplicity, and musical quality. Herrick was also a vicar of Dean Prior in Devon, despite being ejected during the English Civil War and later reinstated.

Robert Herrick

Upon Himself.

Robert Herrick, Simple Poetry

His Parting From Mrs. Dorothy Kennedy.

Robert Herrick, Simple Poetry

To His Ever-Loving God.

Robert Herrick, Simple Poetry

War.

Robert Herrick, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Upon Spokes.

Spokes, when he sees a roasted pig, he swears
Nothing he loves on't but the chaps and ears:
But carve to him the fat flanks, and he shall
Rid these, and those, and part by part eat all.

Robert Herrick

Upon Hog.

Hog has a place i' the' kitchen, and his share,
The flimsy livers and blue gizzards are.

Robert Herrick

Upon Rook. Epig.

Rook he sells feathers, yet he still doth cry
Fie on this pride, this female vanity.
Thus, though the Rook does rail against the sin,
He loves the gain that vanity brings in.

Robert Herrick

His Grange, Or Private Wealth

Though clock,
To tell how night draws hence, I've none,
A cock
I have to sing how day draws on:
I have
A maid, my Prue, by good luck sent,
To save
That little, Fates me gave or lent.
A hen
I keep, which, creeking day by day,
Tells when
She goes her long white egg to lay:
A goose
I have, which, with a jealous ear,
Lets loose
Her tongue, to tell what danger's near.
A lamb
I keep, tame, with my morsels fed,
Whose dam
An orphan left him, lately dead:
A cat
I keep, that plays about my house,
Grown fat
With eating many a miching mouse:
To these
A Trasy I do keep, whereby
I please
The more my rural privacy:
Which are
But toys, to give my heart some ease:
Where care
None is, slight things do li...

Robert Herrick

The Master-Cook

With us there rade a Maister-Cook that came
From the Rochelle which is neere Angouleme.
Littel hee was, but rounder than a topp,
And his small berd hadde dipped in manie a soppe,
His honde was smoother than beseemeth mann's,
And his discoorse was all of marzipans,
Of tripes of Caen, or Burdeux snailes swote,
And Seinte Menhoulde wher cooken pigges-foote.
To Thoulouse and to Bress and Carcasson
For pyes and fowles and chesnottes hadde hee wonne,
Of hammes of Thuringie colde hee prate,
And well hee knew what Princes hadde on plate
At Christmas-tide, from Artois to Gascogne.

Lordinges, quod hee, manne liveth nat alone
By bred, but meates rost and seethed, and broth,
And purchasable deinties, on mine othe.
Honey and hote gingere well liketh hee,
And wha...

Rudyard

Steam In Sacrifice.

If meat the gods give, I the steam
High-towering will devote to them,
Whose easy natures like it well,
If we the roast have, they the smell.

Robert Herrick