THE FUNERAL

WHOEVER Comes to shroud me, do not harm,
Nor question much,

That subtle wreath of hair which crowns my arm;
The mystery, the sign you must not touch;
For 't is my outward soul,

Viceroy to that, which unto heaven being gone,
Will leave this to control

And keep these limbs, her provinces, from dissolutiön.

For if the sinewy thread my brain lets fall
Through every part

Can tie those parts, and make me one of all,

These hairs which upward grew, and strength and art Have from a better brain,

Can better do't; except she meant that I

By this should know my pain,

As prisoners then are manacled, when they're condemn'd to die.

Whate'er she meant by it, bury it with me;
For since I am

Love's martyr, it might breed idolatry

If into other hands these relics came.

As 't was humility

To afford to it all that a soul can do,

So 't is some bravery

That, since you would have none of me, I bury some of

you.

THE RELIC

WHEN my grave is broke up again
Some second guest to entertain,
And he that digs it, spies

A bracelet of bright hair about the bone,
Will not he let us alone,

And think that there a loving couple lies,

Who thought that this device might be some way

To make their souls at the last busy day

Meet at this grave, and make a little stay?

If this fall in a time or land

Where mass-devotion doth command,
Then he that digs us up will bring
Us to the bishop or the king,

To make us relics; then

Thou shalt be a Mary Magdalen, and I

A something else thereby;

All women shall adore us, and some men.
And, since at such time miracles are sought,
I would that age were by this paper taught
What miracles we harmless lovers wrought.

First we loved well and faithfully,

Yet knew not what we loved, nor why;
Difference of sex no more we knew
Than our guardian angels do;

Coming and going we

Perchance might kiss, but not between those meals;
Our hands ne'er touch'd the seals,

Which nature, injured by late law, sets free.9
These miracles we did; but now alas!

All measure, and all language, I should pass,
Should I tell what a miracle she was.

THE DAMP

WHEN I am dead, and doctors know not why,

And my friends' curiosity

Will have me cut up

to survey each

part,

When they shall find your picture in my heart,

You think a sudden damp of love

Will thorough all their senses move, And work on them as me, and so prefer Your murder to the name of massacre.

Poor victories! but if you dare be brave,

And pleasure in your conquest have,

First kill th' enormous giant, your Disdain; And let th' enchantress Honour next be slain; And like a Goth or Vandal rise,

Deface recòrds and histories

Of your own arts and triumphs over men,
And without such advantage kiil me then,

For I could muster up, as well as you,

My giants, and my

witches too,

Which are vast Constancy and Secretness;
But these I neither look for nor profess.