Andrew Marvell

How vainly men themselves amaze, / To win the palm, the oak, or bays; / And their incessant labours see / Crowned from some single herb or tree.

Meanwhile the mind, from pleasure less, Withdraws into its happiness; The mind, that ocean where each kind Does straight its own resemblance find; Yet it creates, transcending these, Far other worlds, and other seas; Annihilating all that's made To a green thought in a green glade ... Such was that happy garden-state.

How could such sweet and wholesome hours be reckoned, but in herbs and flowers?

Now therefore, while the youthful hue Sits on thy skin like morning dew, And while thy willing soul transpires At every pore with instant fires Now let us sport us while we may, And now, like amorous birds of prey, Rather at once our time devour Than languish in his slow-chapped power. Let us roll our strength and all Our sweetness up into one ball And tear our pleasures with rough strife Through the iron gates of life: Thus, while we cannot make our sun Stand still, yet we will make him run.

Annihilating all that's made, To a green thought in a green shade.

Self-preservation, nature's first great law, all the creatures, except man, doth awe.

Like the vain curlings of the watery maze,_x000D_ Which in smooth streams a sinking weight does raise,_x000D_ So Man, declining always, disappears_x000D_ In the weak circles of increasing years;_x000D_ And his short tumults of themselves compose,_x000D_ While flowing Time above his head does close.

Therefore the love which us doth bind,_x000D_ _x000D_ But fate so enviously debars,_x000D_ _x000D_ Is the conjunction of the mind,_x000D_ _x000D_ And opposition of the stars.

Had we but world enough, and time, this coyness, lady, were no crime.

But at my back I always hear Time's winged chariot hurrying near.

What wondrous life is this I lead!_x000D_ _x000D_ Ripe apples drop about my head;_x000D_ _x000D_ The luscious clusters of the vine_x000D_ _x000D_ Upon my mouth do crush their wine;_x000D_ _x000D_ The nectarine and curious peach_x000D_ _x000D_ Into my hands themselves do reach;_x000D_ _x000D_ Stumbling on melons, as I pass,_x000D_ _x000D_ Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass.

And yonder all before us lie Deserts of vast eternity.

My love is of a birth as rare As 'tis, for object, strange and high; It was begotten by Despair Upon Impossibility.