[2] Carketh. Here used transitively, “troubles,” though in Old English it is generally intransitive, meaning to be careful or thoughtful; it is from the Anglo-Saxon Carian; it became obsolete in the seventeenth century. The substantive cark, trouble or anxiety, is generally in Old English coupled with “care”.
[3] Self-pleached, self-entangled or intertwined. Cf. Shakespeare, “pleached bower,” Much Ado, iii., i., 7.
[4] 1830. “Long purples,” thus marking that the phrase is borrowed from Shakespeare, Hamlet, iv., vii., 169:—
and long purples
That liberal shepherds give a grosser name.
It is the purple-flowered orchis, orchis mascula.
[5] 1830. Through.
[6] Balm cricket, the tree cricket; balm is a corruption of baum.
Love and Death
First printed in 1830.
What time the mighty moon was gathering light[[1]]
Love paced the thymy plots of Paradise,
And all about him roll’d his lustrous eyes;
When, turning round a cassia, full in view
Death, walking all alone beneath a yew,
And talking to himself, first met his sight:
“You must begone,” said Death, “these walks are mine”.
Love wept and spread his sheeny vans[[2]] for flight;
Yet ere he parted said, “This hour is thine;
Thou art the shadow of life, and as the tree
Stands in the sun and shadows all beneath,
So in the light of great eternity
Life eminent creates the shade of death;
The shadow passeth when the tree shall fall,
But I shall reign for ever over all”.[[3]]
[1] The expression is Virgil’s, Georg., i., 427: “Luna revertentes cum primum colligit ignes”.
[2] Vans used also for “wings” by Milton, Paradise Lost, ii., 927-8:—
His sail-broad vans
He spreads for flight.
So also Tasso, Ger. Lib., ix., 60: “Indi spiega al gran volo i vanni aurati”.