Читать книгу Selected Works - George Herbert - Страница 43

WHILE that my soul repairs to her devotion,

Here I entombe my flesh, that it betimes

May take acquaintance of this heap of dust;

To which the blast of death’s incessant motion,

Fed with the exhalation of our crimes,

Drives all at last. Therefore I gladly trust

My bodie to this school, that it may learn

To spell his elements, and finde hb birth

Written in dustie heraldrie and lines;

Which dissolution sure doth best discern,

Comparing dust with dust, and earth with earth.

These laugh at Jeat, and Marble put for signes,

To sever the good fellowship of dust,

And spoil the meeting. What shall point out them,

When they shall bow, and kneel, and fall down flat

To kisse those heaps, which now they have in trust?

Deare flesh, while I do pray, learn here thy stemme

And true descent; that when thou shalt grow fat,

And wanton in thy cravings, thou mayst know,

That flesh is but the glasse, which holds the dust

That measures all our time; which also shall

Be crumbled into dust. Mark here below,

How tame these ashes are, how free from lust,

That thou mayst fit thyself against thy fall.