To Live Merrily, and to Trust to Good Verses by Robert Herrick

Now is the time for mirth;
Nor cheek or tongue be dumb;
For with [the] flowery earth
The golden pomp is come.

 The golden pomp is come;
 For now each tree does wear,
 Made of her pap and gum,
 Rich beads of amber here.

 Now reigns the Rose, and now
 Th' Arabian dew besmears
 My uncontrolled brow,
 And my retorted hairs.

 Homer, this health to thee!
 In sack of such a kind,
 That it would make thee see,
 Though thou wert ne'er so blind

 Next, Virgil I'll call forth,
 To pledge this second health
 In wine, whose each cup's worth
 An Indian commonwealth.

 A goblet next I'll drink
 To Ovid; and suppose
 Made he the pledge, he'd think
 The world had all one nose.

 Then this immensive cup
 Of aromatic wine,
 Catullus!  I quaff up
 To that terse muse of thine.

 Wild I am now with heat:
 O Bacchus!  cool thy rays;
 Or frantic I shall eat
 Thy Thyrse, and bite the Bays!

 Round, round, the roof does run;
 And being ravish'd thus,
 Come, I will drink a tun
 To my Propertius.

 Now, to Tibullus next,
 This flood I drink to thee;
 —But stay, I see a text,
 That this presents to me.

 Behold!  Tibullus lies
 Here burnt, whose small return
 Of ashes scarce suffice
 To fill a little urn.

 Trust to good verses then;
 They only will aspire,
 When pyramids, as men,
 Are lost i' th' funeral fire.

 And when all bodies meet
 In Lethe to be drown'd;
 Then only numbers sweet
 With endless life are crown'd.