Page:Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1918.djvu/226

 WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Let the priest in surplice white That defunctive music can, Be the death-divining swan,

Lest the requiem lack his right

And thou, treble-dated crow, That thy sable gender mak'st With the breath thou giv'bt and tak'st-

'Mongst our mourners shalt thou go.

Here the anthem doth commence Love and constancy is dead, Phoenix and the turtle fled

In a mutual flame from hence.

So they loved, as love in twain Had the essence but in one; Two distmcts, division none;

Number there in love was slain.

Hearts remote, yet not asunder; Distance, and no space was seen 'Twixt the turtle and his queen:

But in them it were a wonder.

So between them love did shine, That the turtle saw his right Flaming in the phoenix' sight;

Either was the other's mine.

Property was thus appall 'd,

That the self was not the same; Single nature's double name Neither two nor one was callM.

can] knows.

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