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The Nymph Complaining For The Death Of Her Faun

The wanton Troopers riding

Have shot my Faun and it will dye.

Ungentle men!

They cannot

To kill thee.

Thou neer didst

Them any harm: alas nor

Thy death yet do them any good.

I'me sure I never wisht them ill;

Nor do I for all this; nor will:

But, if my simple Pray'rs may

Prevail with Heaven to

Thy murder,

I will Joyn my

Rather then fail.

But,

O my fears!

It cannot dye so.

Heavens

Keeps register of every thing:

And nothing may we use in vain.

Ev'n Beasts must be with justice slain;

Else Men are made their Deodands.

Though they should wash their guilty

In this warm life blood, which doth

From thine, and wound me to the Heart,

Yet could they not be clean: their

Is dy'd in such a Purple Grain.

There is not such another

The World, to offer for their Sin,

Unconstant Sylvio, when yetI had not found him counterfeit,

One morning (I remember well)Ty'd in this silver Chain and Bell,

Gave it to me: nay and I

What he said then;

I'm sure I do.

Said He, look how your Huntsman

Hath taught a Faun to hunt his Dear.

But Sylvio soon had me beguil'd.

This waxed tame; while he grew wild,

And quite regardless of my Smart,

Left me his Faun, but took his Heart.

Thenceforth I set my self to

My solitary time away,

With this: and very well content,

Could so mine idle Life have spent.

For it was full of sport; and

Of foot, and heart; and did invite,

Me to its game: it seem'd to

Its self in me.

How could I

Than love it?

O I cannot

Unkind, t' a Beast that loveth me.

Had it liv'd long,

I do not

Whether it too might have done

As Sylvio did: his Gifts might

Perhaps as false or more than he.

But I am sure, for ought that

Could in so short a time espie,

Thy Love was far more better

The love of false and cruel men.

With sweetest milk, and sugar, firstI it at mine own fingers nurst.

And as it grew, so every

It wax'd more white and sweet than they.

It had so sweet a Breath!

And oftI blusht to see its foot more soft,

And white, (shall I say then my hand?)Nay any Ladies of the Land.

It is a wond'rous thing, how

Twas on those little silver feet.

With what a pretty skipping grace,

It oft would callenge me the Race:

And when 'thad left me far away,'T would stay, and run again, and stay.

For it was nimbler much than Hindes;

And trod, as on the four Winds.

I have a Garden of my own,

But so with Roses over grown,

And Lillies, that you would it

To be a little Wilderness.

And all the Spring time of the

It onely loved to be there.

Among the beds of Lillyes,

Have sought it oft, where it should lye;

Yet could not, till it self would rise,

Find it, although before mine Eyes.

For, in the flaxen Lillies shade,

It like a bank of Lillies laid.

Upon the Roses it would feed,

Until its lips ev'n seem'd to bleed:

And then to me 'twould boldly trip,

And print those Roses on my Lip.

But all its chief delight was

On Roses thus its self to fill:

And its pure virgin Limbs to

In whitest sheets of Lillies cold.

Had it liv'd long, it would have

Lillies without,

Roses within.

O help!

O help!

I see it faint:

And dye as calmely as a Saint.

See how it weeps.

The Tears do

Sad, slowly dropping like a Gumme.

So weeps the wounded Balsome:

The holy Frankincense doth flow.

The brotherless

Melt in such Amber Tears as these.

I in a golden Vial

Keep these two crystal Tears; and

It till it do o'reflow with mine;

Then place it in Diana's Shrine.

Now my sweet Faun is vanish'd

Whether the Swans and Turtles

In fair Elizium to endure,

With milk-white Lambs, and Ermins pure.

O do not run too fast: for

Will but bespeak thy Grave, and dye.

First my unhappy Statue

Be cut in Marble; and withal,

Let it be weeping too: but

Th' Engraver sure his Art may spare;

For I so truly thee bemoane,

That I shall weep though I be Stone:

Until my Tears, still dropping,

My breast, themselves engraving there.

There at my feet shalt thou be laid,

Of purest Alabaster made:

For I would have thine Image

White as I can, though not as Thee.

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Andrew Marvell

Andrew Marvell (31 March 1621 – 16 August 1678) was an English Metaphysical poet, satirist and politician who sat in the House of Commons at var…

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