| Andrew Macphail, comp. The Book of Sorrow. 1916. | | | VII. The Tyrant
Coelia’s Speech, in the Tragedy of Croesus | | By William Alexander, Earl of Stirling (1567?–1640) |
| | | FIERCE tyrant, Death, who in thy wrath didst take | |
| One half of me, and left one half behind: | |
| Take this to thee, or give me th’other back, | |
| Be wholly cruel, or be no way kind! | |
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| But whilst I live, believe, thou canst not die— | 5 |
| O! even in spite of Death, yet still my choice! | |
| Oft, with the inward all-beholding eye | |
| I think I see thee, and I hear thy voice; | |
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| And to content my languishing desire, | |
| To ease my mind, each thing some help affords; | 10 |
| Thy fancied form doth oft such faith acquire, | |
| That in all sounds I apprehend thy words. | |
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| Then, with such thoughts my memory to wound, | |
| I call to mind thy looks, thy words, thy grace— | |
| Where thou didst haunt, yet I adore the ground, | 15 |
| And where thou stept—O sacred seems that place! | |
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| My solitary walks, my widow’d bed, | |
| My dreary sighs, my sheets oft bath’d with tears, | |
| These shall record what life by me is led | |
| Since first sad news breath’d death into mine ears. | 20 |
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| Though for more pain yet spar’d a space by death, | |
| Thee first I lov’d, with thee all love I leave; | |
| For my chaste flames, which quench’d were with thy breath, | |
| Can kindle now no more but in thy grave!… | | | | |
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