SIR EDWARD DYER'S POEM - A SILENT POEM

 

On the 27 th day of the Blog chatter’s #WRITEAPAGEADAY, Here is a poem with love as the major theme.

 

Poet:  SIR EDWARD DYER

Poem:   A SILENT LOVE

 

The lowest trees have tops, the ant her gall,
The fly her spleen, the little spark his heat;
And slender hairs cast shadows, though but small,
And bees have stings, although they be not great.
 Seas have their source, and so have shallow springs,
 And love is love, in beggars and in kings.

Where waters smoothest run, there deepest are the fords,
The dial stirs, yet none perceives it move;
The firmest faith is found in fewest words,
The turtles do not sing, and yet they love;
 True hearts have ears and eyes, no tongues to speak;
 They hear and see, and sigh, and then they break.

 

Sir Edward Dyer was a 16^th century English poet and popular member at the court of Queen Elizabeth I. Being a court poet, Dyer was also commissioned by the Queen with a number of trips abroad and within England. His contemporaries praised his skill as a poet.

 

 His first patron was Robert Dudley, who seems to have thought of putting him forward as a rival to Sir Christopher Hatton for the queen's favour. He is mentioned by Gabriel Harvey, along with Sir Philip Sidney, as one of the ornaments of the court. Sidney, in his will, bequeathed his books equally between Fulke Greville and Dyer. He was made steward of Woodstock in 1570.

 

 Author of two of the most famous Elizabethan lyrics, 'My Mind to Me a Kingdom is' and 'The Lowest Trees have Tops', Dyer cut a figure of some significance at Elizabeth's Court and became Chancellor of the Order of the Garter.

 

   His modern biographer, Ralph Sargent (The Life and Lyrics of Sir Edward Dyer, 1968, concludes that as 'the earliest of the Elizabethan "courtly makers", Dyer brought forth possibly the first fine lyrics of the Renaissance in England...[and] amongst the swelling chorus of all Elizabeth's poets, he strikes a rich, lingering minor chord.