Life of my life, take not so soon thy flight, <br />But stay the time till we have bade good-night. <br />Thou hast both wind and tide with thee; thy way <br />As soon dispatch'd is by the night as day. <br />Let us not then so rudely henceforth go <br />Till we have wept, kiss'd, sigh'd, shook hands, or so. <br />There's pain in parting, and a kind of hell <br />When once true lovers take their last farewell. <br />What? shall we two our endless leaves take here <br />Without a sad look, or a solemn tear? <br />He knows not love that hath not this truth proved, <br />Love is most loth to leave the thing beloved. <br />Pay we our vows and go; yet when we part, <br />Then, even then, I will bequeath my heart <br />Into thy loving hands; for I'll keep none <br />To warm my breast, when thou, my pulse, art gone, <br />No, here I'll last, and walk, a harmless shade, <br />About this urn, wherein thy dust is laid, <br />To guard it so, as nothing here shall be <br />Heavy, to hurt those sacred seeds of thee.<br /><br />Robert Herrick<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-his-dying-brother-master-william-herrick/
