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Edmund Spenser - Astrophel
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A Pastorall Elegie vpon the death of the  most Noble and valorous Knight, Sir Philip Sidney. Dedicated To the most beautifull  and vertuous Ladie, the Countesse of Essex. 

Shepheards, that wont, on pipes of oaten reed,
Oft times to plaint  your loues concealed smart:
And with your  piteous layes haue learnd to breed
Compassion in a  countrey lasses hart.
Hearken ye gentle  shepheards to my song,
And place my  dolefull plaint your plaints emong. 
To you alone I sing  this mournfull verse,
The mournfulst verse  that euer man heard tell:
To you whose  softened hearts it may empierse,
VVith dolours dart  for death of Astrophel.
To you I sing and to  none other wight,
For well I wot my  rymes bene rudely dight.

Yet as they been, if  any nycer wit
Shall hap to heare,  or couet them to read:
Thinke he, that such  are for such ones most fit,
Made not to please  the liuing but the dead.
And if in him found  pity euer place,
Let him be moou`d to  pity such a case.

Astrophel.
A Gentle Shepheard  borne in Arcady,
Of gentlest race  that euer shepheard bore:
About the grassie  bancks of Hæmony,
Did keepe his sheep,  his litle stock and store.
Full carefully he  kept them day and night,
In fairest fields,  and Astrophel he hight.

Young Astrophel the  pride of shepheards praise,
Young Astrophel the  rusticke lasses loue:
Far passing all the  pastors of his daies,
In all that seemly  shepheard might behoue.
In one thing onely  fayling of the best,
That he was not so  happie as the rest.

For from the time  that first the Nymph his mother
Him forth did bring,  and taught her lambs to feed:
A sclender swaine  excelling far each other,
In comely shape,  like her that did him breed.
He grew vp fast in  goodnesse and in grace,
And doubly faire wox  both in mynd and face.

Which daily more and  more he did augment,
With gentle vsage  and demeanure myld:
That all mens hearts  with secret rauishment
He stole away, and  weetingly beguyld.
Ne spight it selfe  that all good things doth spill,
Found ought in him,  that she could say was ill.

His sports were  faire, his ioyance innocent, 
Sweet without sowre,  and honny without gall:
And he himselfe  seemd made for meriment,
Merily masking both  in bowre and hall.
There was no  pleasure nor delightfull play,
When Astrophel so  euer was away.

For he could pipe  and daunce, and caroll sweet,
Emongst the  shepheards in their shearing feast:
As Somers larke that  with her song doth greet,
The dawning day  forth comming from the East.
And layes of loue he  also could compose,
Thrise happie she,  whom he to praise did chose.

Full many Maydens  often did him woo,
Them to vouchsafe  emongst his rimes to name,
Or make for them as  he was wont to doo,
For her that did his  heart with loue inflame.
For which they  promised to dight for him,
Gay chapelets of  flowers and gyrlonds trim.

And many a Nymph  both of the wood and brooke,
Soone as his oaten  pipe began to shrill:
Both christall wells  and shadie groues forsooke,
To heare the charmes of his enchanting skill.
And brought him  presents, flowers if it were prime,
Or mellow fruit if  it were haruest time.

But he for none of  them did care a whit,
Yet wood Gods for  them oft[en] sighed sore:
Ne for their gifts  vnworthie of his wit,
Yet not vnworthie of  the countries store.
For one alone he  cared, for one he sight,
His lifes desire,  and his deare loues delight.

Stella the faire,  the fairest star in skie, 
As faire as Venus or  the fairest faire:
A fairer star saw  neuer liuing eie,
[S]hot her sharp  pointed beames through purest aire.
Her he did loue, her  he alone did honor,
His thoughts, his  rimes, his songs were all vpõn her.

To her he vowd the  seruice of his daies,
On her he spent the  riches of his wit:
For her he made  hymnes of immortall praise,
Of onely her he  sung, he thought, he writ.
Her, and but her of  loue he deemed, 
For all the rest but  little he esteemed.

Ne her with ydle  words alone he wowed,
And verses vaine  (yet verses are not vaine)
But with braue deeds  to her sole seruice vowed,
And bold  achieuements her did entertaine.
For both in deeds  and words he nourtred was,
Both wise and hardie  (too hardie alas!)

In wrestling nimble,  and in renning swift,
In shooting steddie,  and in swimming strong: 
Well made to strike,  to throw, to leape, to lift,
And all the sports  that shepheards are emong. 
In euery one he  vanquisht euery one,
He vanquist all, and  vanquisht was of none.

Besides, in hunting  such felicitie,
Or rather  infelicitie he found:
That euery field and  forest far away,
He sought, where  saluage beasts do most abound. 
No beast so saluage  but he could it kill,
No chace so hard,  but he therein had skill.

Such skill matcht  with such courage as he had,
Did prick him foorth  with proud desire of praise:
To seek abroad, of  daunger nought y`drad,
His mistresse name,  and his owne fame to raise. 
What need[eth]  perill to be sought abroad,
Since round about us, it doth make abroad!

It fortuned as he, that perlous game
In forreine soyle pursued far away:
Into a forest wide, and waste he came
Where store he heard to be of saluage pray.
So wide a forest and so waste as this,
Nor famous Ardeyn, nor fowle Arlo, is.

There his welwouen  toyles and subtil traines,
He laid the brutish  nation to enwrap:
So well he wrought  with practise and with paines,
That he of them great troups did soone entrap.
Full happie man (misweening much) was hee,
So rich a spoile within his power to see.

Eftsoones all heedlesse of his dearest hale,
Full greedily into the heard he thrust:
To slaughter them, and work their finall bale,
Least that his tolye should of their troups be brust.
Wide wounds emongst them many a one he made,
Now with his sharp borespeare, now with his blade.

His care was all how  he them all might kill,
That none might  scape (so partiall vnto none)
Ill mynd so much to  mynd anothers ill, 
As to become  vnmyndfull of his owne.
But pardon that vnto  the cruell skies,
That from himselfe  to them withdrew his eies.

So as he rag`d  emongst that beastly rout,
A cruell beast of  most accursed brood:
Vpon him turnd  (despeyre makes cowards stout)
And with fell tooth  accustomed to blood,
Launched his thigh  with so mischieuous might,
That it both bone  and muscles ryued quight. 

So deadly was the  dint and deep the wound,
And so huge streames  of blood thereout did flow:
That he endured not  the direfull stound,
But on the cold  deare earth himselfe did throw.
The whiles the  captiue heard his nets did rend,
And hauing none to  let, to wood did wend.

Ah where were ye  this while his shepheard peares,
To whom aliue was  nought so deare as hee:
And ye faire Mayds  the matches of his yeares,
Which in his grace  did boast you most to bee!
Ah where were ye,  when he of you had need,
To stop his wound  that wondrously did bleed!

Ah wretched boy the  shape of dreryhead, 
And sad ensample of  mans suddein end:
Full litle faileth  but thou shalt be dead,
Vnpitied, vnplaynd,  of foe or frend.
Whilest none is  nigh, thine eylids vp to close,
And kisse thy lips  like faded leaues of rose.

A sort of shepheards  sewing of the chace,
As they the forest  raunged on a day:
By fate or fortune  came vnto the place,
Where as the  lucklesse boy yet bleeding lay.
Yet bleeding lay,  and yet would still haue bled,
Had not good hap  those shepheards thether led.

They stopt his wound  (too late to stop it was)
And in their armes  they softly did him reare:
Tho (as he wild)  vnto his loued lasse,
His dearest loue him  dolefully did beare.
The dolefulst beare  that euer man did see,
Was Astrophel, but  dearest vnto mee!

She when she saw her  loue in such a plight,
With crudled blood  and filthie gore deformed:
That wont to be with  flowers and gyrlonds dight,
And her deare  fauours dearly well adorned
Her face, the  fairest face that eye mote see,
She likewise did  deforme like him to bee. 

Her yellow locks  that shone so bright and long,
As Sunny beames in  fairest somers day:
She fiersly tore,  and with outragious wrong
From her red cheeks  the roses rent away. 
And her faire brest  the threasury of ioy,
She spoyld therof,  and filled with annoy.

His palled face  impictured with death,
She bathed oft with  teares and dried oft:
And with sweet  kisses suckt the wasting breath,
Out of his lips like  lillies pale and soft.
And oft she cald to  him, who answerd nought,
But onely by his  lookes did tell his thought.

The rest of her  impatient regret,
And piteous mone the  which she for him made:
No toong can tell,  nor any forth can set,
But he whose heart  like sorrow did inuade.
At last when paine  his vitall powres had spent,
His wasted life her  weary lodge forwent.

Which when she saw,  she staied not a whit, 
But after him did  make vntimely haste:
Forth with her ghost  out of her corpse did flit,
And followed her  make like Turtle chaste.
To proue that death  their hearts cannot diuide,
Which liuing were in  loue so firmly tide.

The Gods which all  things see, this same beheld, 
And pittying this  paire of louers trew:
Transformed them  there lying on the field,
Into one flowre that  is both red and blew.
It first growes red,  and then to blew doth fade,
Like Astrophel,  which thereinto was made.

And in the midst  thereof a star appeares,
As fairly formd as  any star in skyes:
Resembling Stella in  her freshest yeares,
Forth darting beames  of beautie from her eyes,
And all the day it  standeth full of deow,
Which is the teares,  that from her eyes did flow.

That hearbe of some,  Starlight is cald by name,
Of others Penthia,  though not so well:
But thou where euer  thou dost finde the same,
From this day forth  do call it Astrophel.
And when so euer  thou it vp doest take,
Do pluck it softly  for that shepheards sake.

Hereof when tydings  far abroad did passe,
The shepheards all  which loued him full deare: 
And sure full deare  of all he loued was,
Did thether flock to  see what they did heare.
And when that  pitteous spectacle they vewed,
The same with bitter  teares they all bedewed.

And euery one did  make exceeding mone,
With inward anguish  and great griefe opprest:
And euery one did  weep and waile and mone, 
And meanes deuiz`d  to shew his sorrow best.
That from that houre  since first on grassie greene,
Shepheards kept  sheep, was not like mourning seen.

But first his sister that Clorinda hight,
The gentlest shepheardesse that lives this day,
And most resembling both in shape and spright
Her brother deare, began this dolefull lay.
Which, least I marre the sweetnesse of the vearse,
In sort as she it sung I will rehearse.
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