Herrick's Elegy

Who was lost, in the elegy Herrick
composed ? Grief, a blister, its driving rain
raised to swell, and burst ? It was in Warwick
I bought his verse, when I took the train

for a trip, as my daughter was conceived.
Was it for Julia that he rehearsed
all the pagan options, poetry received
for the dead ? She, installed a star, immersed

a nymph in a brook, raised a genius
to guide nations, whose state secret name
could not be said, some metamorophosis
into bird or plant ? The girlfriend remained

missing though, her name burst in memory.
Daughter - don’t be lost like Persephone.

Woodford Halse - 2 August 2021

Robert Herrick ( 1591 - 1674) published his Hesperides in 1648. His “Elegy” is one of his additional poems. He was a cavalier poet who became a Church of England clergyman, the Rector of Dean Prior in Devon.

The goddess Annonia preserved the secret name of Rome at Tivoli.