Living
To Groves.
From Hesperides (1648)
YEe silent shades, whose each tree here
Some Relique of a Saint doth weare:
Who for some sweet-hearts sake, did prove
The fire, and martyrdome of love.
Here is the Legend of those Saints
That did for love; and their complaints:
Their wounded hearts; and names we find
Encarv'd upon the Leaves and Rind.
Give way, give way to me, who come
Scorch't with the selfe-same martyrdome:
And have deserv'd as much (Love knowes)
As to be canoniz'd 'mongst those,
Whose deeds, and deaths here written are
Within your Greenie-Kalendar:
By all those Virgins Fillets hung
Upon your Boughs, and Requiems sung
For Saints and Soules departed hence,
(Here honour'd still with Frankincense)
By all those teares that have been shed,
As a Drink-offering, to the dead:
By all those True-love-knots, that be
With Motto's carv'd on every tree,
By sweet S. Phillis; pitie me:
By deare S. Iphis; and the rest,
Of all those other Saints now blest;
Me, me, forsaken, here admit
Among your Mirtles to be writ:
That my poore name may have the glory
To live remembred in your story.
Cite this poem
MLA
Herrick, Robert. “To Groves.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/herrick/450/.
Chicago
Herrick, Robert. “To Groves.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/herrick/450/.
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