Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
England: Vols. I–IV. 1876–79. | | | | Glastonbury | | Glastonbury | | Michael Drayton (1563–1631) |
| | From “Poly-Olbion”
O THREE times famous isle, where is that place that might | |
| Be with thyself compared for glory and delight, | |
| Whilst Glastonbury stood? exalted to that pride, | |
| Whose monastery seemed all other to deride: | |
| O, who thy ruin sees, whom wonder doth not fill | 5 |
| With their great fathers’ pomp, devotion, and their skill? | |
| Thou more than mortal power (this judgment rightly weighed) | |
| Then present to assist, at that foundation laid; | |
| On whom for this sad waste should justice lay the crime? | |
| Is there a power in fate, or doth it yield to time? | 10 |
| Or was there error such, that thou couldst not protect | |
| Those buildings which thy hand did with their zeal erect? | |
| To whom didst thou commit that monument to keep, | |
| That suffered with the dead their memory to sleep, | |
| When not great Arthur’s tomb nor holy Joseph’s grave | 15 |
| From sacrilege had power their sacred bones to save? | |
| He who that God in man to his sepulchre brought, | |
| Or he which for the faith twelve famous battles fought. | |
| What! did so many kings do honor to that place, | |
| For avarice at last so vilely to deface? | 20 |
| For reverence to that seat which had ascribéd been, | |
| Trees yet in winter bloom, and bear their summer’s green. | | | | |
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