Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets (1590-1650): Anonymous Plays

Ye too, dim watchfires of some darkling hour,
Whose fame forlorn time saves not nor proclaims
For ever, but forgetfulness defames
And darkness and the shadow of death devour,
Lift up ye too your light, put forth your power,
Let the far twilight feel your soft small flames
And smile, albeit night name not even their names,
Ghost by ghost passing, flower blown down on flower:
That sweet-tongued shadow, like a stars that passed
Singing, and light was from its darkness cast
To paint the face of Painting fair with praise:¹
And that wherein forefigured smiles the pure
Fraternal face of Wordsworths Elidure
Between two child-faced masks of merrier days.²

Algernon Charles Swinburne

Algernon Charles Swinburne was an English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic. Born on April 5, 1837, in London, he became known for his innovative versification and erotic content. Swinburne was a central figure in the aesthetic and decadent movements. His major works include 'Poems and Ballads' and 'Atalanta in Calydon.' He died on April 10, 1909, in Putney, London. Swinburne's legacy is marked by his lyrical mastery and controversial themes, influencing countless poets thereafter.

Algernon Charles Swinburne

Nell Gwyn

Algernon Charles Swinburne, Simple Poetry

A New Year's Eve

Algernon Charles Swinburne, Simple Poetry

A Reiver's Neck-Verse

Algernon Charles Swinburne, Simple Poetry

Envoi

Algernon Charles Swinburne, Simple Poetry

English

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Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets (1590-1650): Anonymous Plays

More yet and more, and yet we mark not all:
The Warning fain to bid fair women heed
Its hard brief note of deadly doom and deed;¹
The verse that strewed too thick with flowers the hall
Whence Nero watched his fiery festival;²
That iron page wherein mens eyes who read
See, bruised and marred between two babes that bleed,
A mad red-handed husbands martyr fall;³
The scene which crossed and streaked with mirth the strife
Of Henry with his sons and witchlike wife;⁴
And that sweet pageant of the kindly fiend,
Who, seeing three friends in spirit and heart made one,
Crowned with good hap the true-love wiles he screened
In the pleached lanes of pleasant Edmonton.⁵

Algernon Charles Swinburne

Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets (1590-1650): James Shirley

The dusk of days decline was hard on dark
When evening trembled round thy glowworm lamp
That shone across her shades and dewy damp
A small clear beacon whose benignant spark
Was gracious yet for loiterers eyes to mark,
Though changed the watchword of our English camp
Since the outposts rang round Marlowes lion ramp,
When thy steeds pace went ambling round Hyde Park.
And in the thickening twilight under thee
Walks Davenant, pensive in the paths where he,
The blithest throat that ever carolled love
In music made of mornings merriest heart,
Glad Suckling, stumbled from his seat above
And reeled on slippery roads of alien art.

Algernon Charles Swinburne

Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets (1590-1650): Thomas Decker

Out of the depths of darkling life where sin
Laughs piteously that sorrow should not know
Her own ill name, nor woe be counted woe;
Where hate and craft and lust make drearier din
Than sounds through dreams that grief holds revel in;
What charm of joy-bells ringing, streams that flow,
Winds that blow healing in each note they blow,
Is this that the outer darkness hears begin?
O sweetest heart of all thy time save one,
Star seen for loves sake nearest to the sun,
Hung lamplike oer a dense and doleful city,
Not Shakespeares very spirit, howeer more great,
Than thine toward man was more compassionate,
Nor gave Christ praise from lips more sweet with pity.

Algernon Charles Swinburne

Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets (1590-1650): Beaumont and Fletcher

An hour ere sudden sunset fired the west,
Arose two stars upon the pale deep east.
The hall of heaven was clear for nights high feast,
Yet was not yet days fiery heart at rest
Love leapt up from his mothers burning breast
To see those warm twin lights, as day decreased,
Wax wider, till when all the sun had ceased
As suns they shone from evenings kindled crest
Across them and between, a quickening fire,
Flamed Venus, laughing with appeased desire.
Their dawn, scarce lovelier for the gleam of tears,
Filled half the hollow shell twixt heaven and earth
With sound like moonlight, mingling moan and mirth,
Which rings and glitters down the darkling years.

Algernon Charles Swinburne

Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets (1590-1650): Anonymous Plays: Arden of Feversham

Mother whose womb brought forth our man of men,
Mother of Shakespeare, whom all time acclaims
Queen therefore, sovereign queen of English dames,
Throned higher than sat thy sonless empress then,
Was it thy sons young passion-guided pen
Which drew, reflected from encircling flames,
A figure marked by the earlier of thy names
Wife, and from all her wedded kinswomen
Marked by the sign of murderess? Pale and great,
Great in her grief and sin, but in her death
And anguish of her penitential breath
Greater than all her sin or sin-born fate,
She stands, the holocaust of dark desire,
Clothed round with song for ever as with fire.

Algernon Charles Swinburne

Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets (1590-1650): Ben Jonson

Broad-based, broad-fronted, bounteous, multiform,
With many a valley impleached with ivy and vine,
Wherein the springs of all the streams run wine,
And many a crag full-faced against the storm,
The mountain where thy Muses feet made warm
Those lawns that revelled with her dance divine
Shines yet with fire as it was wont to shine
From tossing torches round the dance aswarm.

Nor less, high-stationed on the grey grave heights,
High-thoughted seers with heavens heart-kindling lights
Hold converse: and the herd of meaner things
Knows or by fiery scourge or fiery shaft
When wrath on thy broad brows has risen, and laughed,
Darkening thy soul with shadow of thunderous wings.

Algernon Charles Swinburne