Three Verse Passages From A Prose Meditation

Thomas Parnell 1679 (Dublin) – 1718



On verdurd trees ye silver blossoms grow
Whose leaves atop their perfect whiteness show
& faintly streak with stains of red below
The western breeze steales ore ye shady grove
to sigh near roses as insnard by love.

The waves pushed on by waves in mountains ly
Mixd with ye clouds ye Parent waters fly
& the cross'd winds roar hideous in ye sky
The east & west the south & north contend
While the vexd sea beneath is neithers friend
Above ye winds below the billows Jarr
& nature is become the seat of warr

Look how ye silent waters stealing by
With such smooth motions as deceive our eye
Returns ye pleasing pictures of ye sky
There shines ye sun with imitated rayes
her borrowd light ye paler moon displays
& ye cleare heavens wear an azure face
So lett thy temper due composure find
By all the modest rules that bound ye mind
That Whether fortune with a storm assails
Or Courts thy wishes with indulgent gales
No passion interpose a cloud between
But on thy bosome undisturbd within
May natures God & natures form [be seen]

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

57 sec read
38

Quick analysis:

Scheme AAAXX BBBCCAX BBBDDDEEDDFXF
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 1,009
Words 192
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 5, 7, 13

Thomas Parnell

Thomas Parnell was an Anglo-Irish poet and clergyman who was a friend of both Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift. He was the son of Thomas Parnell of Maryborough, Queen's County now Port Laoise, County Laoise}, a prosperous landowner who had been a loyal supporter of Cromwell during the English Civil War and moved to Ireland after the restoration of the monarchy. Thomas was educated at Trinity College, Dublin and collated archdeacon of Clogher in 1705. He however spent much of his time in London, where he participated with Pope, Swift and others in the Scriblerus Club, contributing to The Spectator and aiding Pope in his translation of The Iliad. He was also one of the so-called "Graveyard poets": his 'A Night-Piece on Death,' widely considered the first "Graveyard School" poem, was published posthumously in Poems on Several Occasions, collected and edited by Alexander Pope and is thought by some scholars to have been published in December of 1721 (although dated in 1722 on its title page, the year accepted by The Concise Oxford Chronology of English Literature; see 1721 in poetry, 1722 in poetry). It is said of his poetry 'it was in keeping with his character, easy and pleasing, ennunciating the common places with felicity and grace. more…

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