To The Water-nymphs Drinking At The Fountain

Reach with your whiter hands to me
Some crystal of the spring;
And I about the cup shall see
Fresh lilies flourishing.

Or else, sweet nymphs, do you but this
To th' glass your lips incline;
And I shall see by that one kiss
The water turn'd to wine.

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 A Physician.

Robert Herrick, Simple Poetry

A New Years' Gift Sent To Sir Simeon Steward

Robert Herrick, Simple Poetry

Counsel.

Robert Herrick, Simple Poetry

To God In Time Of Plundering.

Robert Herrick, Simple Poetry

English

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How He Would Drink His Wine.

Fill me my wine in crystal; thus, and thus
I see't in's puris naturalibus:
Unmix'd. I love to have it smirk and shine;
'Tis sin I know, 'tis sin to throttle wine.
What madman's he, that when it sparkles so,
Will cool his flames or quench his fires with snow?

Robert Herrick

To Springs And Fountains.

I heard ye could cool heat, and came
With hope you would allay the same;
Thrice I have wash'd but feel no cold,
Nor find that true which was foretold.
Methinks, like mine, your pulses beat
And labour with unequal heat;
Cure, cure yourselves, for I descry
Ye boil with love as well as I.

Robert Herrick

The Broken Crystal.

To fetch me wine my Lucia went,
Bearing a crystal continent:
But, making haste, it came to pass
She brake in two the purer glass,
Then smil'd, and sweetly chid her speed;
So with a blush beshrew'd the deed.

Robert Herrick

The Lily In A Crystal.

You have beheld a smiling rose
When virgins' hands have drawn
O'er it a cobweb-lawn;
And here you see this lily shows,
Tomb'd in a crystal stone,
More fair in this transparent case
Than when it grew alone
And had but single grace.

You see how cream but naked is
Nor dances in the eye
Without a strawberry,
Or some fine tincture like to this,
Which draws the sight thereto
More by that wantoning with it
Than when the paler hue
No mixture did admit.

You see how amber through the streams
More gently strokes the sight
With some conceal'd delight
Than when he darts his radiant beams
Into the boundless air;
Where either too much light his worth
Doth all at once impair,
Or set it little forth.

Put purple grapes o...

Robert Herrick

The Lily In A Crystal

You have beheld a smiling rose
When virgins' hands have drawn
O'er it a cobweb-lawn:
And here, you see, this lily shows,
Tomb'd in a crystal stone,
More fair in this transparent case
Than when it grew alone,
And had but single grace.

You see how cream but naked is,
Nor dances in the eye
Without a strawberry;
Or some fine tincture, like to this,
Which draws the sight thereto,
More by that wantoning with it,
Than when the paler hue
No mixture did admit.

You see how amber through the streams
More gently strokes the sight,
With some conceal'd delight,
Than when he darts his radiant beams
Into the boundless air;
Where either too much light his worth
Doth all at once impair,
Or set it little forth.

Put purple...

Robert Herrick

His Tears To Thamesis.

I send, I send here my supremest kiss
To thee, my silver-footed Thamesis.
No more shall I reiterate thy Strand,
Whereon so many stately structures stand:
Nor in the summer's sweeter evenings go
To bathe in thee, as thousand others do;
No more shall I along thy crystal glide
In barge with boughs and rushes beautifi'd,
With soft-smooth virgins for our chaste disport,
To Richmond, Kingston, and to Hampton Court.
Never again shall I with finny oar
Put from, or draw unto the faithful shore:
And landing here, or safely landing there,
Make way to my beloved Westminster,
Or to the golden Cheapside, where the earth
Of Julia Herrick gave to me my birth.
May all clean nymphs and curious water-dames
With swan-like state float up and down thy streams:
No drought ...

Robert Herrick