Shall I compose an elegy on thy death,

Or a sanguine lyric from mine tulip’s cud,

Milord --- may fall like mild dew on wreath

Of the claret buds to nip in the bud;

The love, the sweetest love of a crown-prince!

The greatest king, ah, killed the fated calf!

Shall I compose an elegy, when I mince –

And cut the ‘feet’ in syllables, one and half,

Two hundred beads the hermit tells and takes

The chaplet of his rosary in his hand:

A tragedy of the weaker-vessel make

The epilogue, the moon-lit night, the sand;

On shivering throne of marble sits the kings,

Milord – and ‘all’s well that ends well’ doth sing.