A VISION UPON THIS CONCEIT OF

THE FAIRY QUEEN.1

(1590.)

M ETHOUGHT I saw the grave where
        Laura lay,
    Within that temple where the vestal
        flame
Was wont to burn : and, passing by that way,
    To see that buried dust of living fame,
Whose tomb fair Love and fairer Virtue kept,
    All suddenly I saw the Faery Queen,
At whose approach the soul of Petrarch wept ;
    And from thenceforth those graces were not seen,
For they this Queen attended ; in whose stead
    Oblivion laid him down on Laura's hearse.
Hereat the hardest stones were seen to bleed,
    And groans of buried ghosts the heavens did pierce :
Where Homer's spright did tremble all for grief,
And cursed the access of that celestial thief.


1  Appended to Spenser's "Fairy Queen," books i.-iii.,
1590, p. 596.


Source:
Hannah, J., Ed. The Poems of Sir Walter Raleigh.
London: George Bell and Sons, 1891. 8.



Backto the Works of Sir Walter Ralegh


Site copyright ©1996-2007 Anniina Jokinen. All Rights Reserved.
Created by Anniina Jokinen on August 9, 1996. Last updated on March 2, 2007.