What could there more be done, let any say, <br />Nor I did to prevent the doleful day? <br />For when I saw Gall's fatal constellation <br />Would not permit him in this earthly station <br />Long to abide, then did I give a trial, <br />To make impartial fate sustain denial, <br />By herbarizing, while I proved my skill <br />On top of Law Tay, and stay Moore-downe hill, <br />Collecting vegetables in these parts, <br />By all the skill of Appolonian arts, <br />If possible 't had been fate to neglect him, <br />By heavenly skill immortal for to make him; <br />But sith that Phœbus could not stem the blood <br />Of Hyacinthus in his swooning mood, <br />How then should I, a mortal—ah! too shallow <br />In wit and art!—press to outreach Appollo?— <br />Far be the thought; I therefore must absent me, <br />And never more unto the world present me; <br />But solitary with my gabions stay, <br />And help them for to mourn till dying day! <br />Then farewell, cabin! farewell, Gabions all! <br />Then must I meet in heaven with Master Gall; <br />And till that time I will set forth his praise <br />In elegies of woe and mourning lays; <br />And weeping for his sake, still will I cry— <br />“Gall, sweetest Gall, what ailed thee to die?”<br /><br />Henry Adamson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-muses-threnodie-ninth-muse/
