The English playwright James Shirley (1596–1666) was the last of Shakespeare’s line — the last of the literary figures who had flourished before the English Civil War and the Restoration. Few of his plays are still performed, which is a shame, for he had a kind of genius of correctness of form and content in an era that would not be recreated by Restoration drama. What does remain is “The Glories of Our Blood and State,” a poetic passage from Shirley’s masque, “The Contention of Ajax and Ulysses for the Armour of Achilles” (1659). Still sometimes performed as a hymn for state funerals, the poem consists of three eight-line stanzas, rhymed ababccdd, of tetrameter verse, with the fifth and six lines trimmed to dimeter for effect. The theme is a common one in the era: Pomp and power are vanities; death claims even kings and nobles. But rarely has the theme been done as well — as correctly and as concisely — as Shirley managed.

The Glories of Our Blood and State 
by James Shirley

The glories of our blood and state 
Are shadows, not substantial things; 
There is no armor against fate; 
Death lays his icy hand on kings. 
    Scepter and crown 
    Must tumble down 
And in the dust be equal made 
With the poor crooked scythe and spade. 

Some men with swords may reap the field 
And plant fresh laurels where they kill, 
But their strong nerves at last must yield; 
They tame but one another still. 
    Early or late 
    They stoop to fate 
And must give up their murmuring breath, 
When they, pale captives, creep to death. 

The garlands wither on your brow, 
Then boast no more your mighty deeds; 
Upon death’s purple altar now 
See where the victor-victim bleeds. 
    Your heads must come 
    To the cold tomb; 
Only the actions of the just 
Smell sweet and blossom in their dust.

___________________________________________ 

With “Poem of the Day,” The New York Sun offers a daily portion of verse selected by Joseph Bottum with the help of the North Carolina poet Sally Thomas, the Sun’s associate poetry editor. Tied to the day, or the season, or just individual taste, the poems will be typically drawn from the lesser-known portion of the history of English verse. In the coming months we will be reaching out to contemporary poets for examples of current, primarily formalist work, to show that poetry can still serve as a delight to the ear, an instruction to the mind, and a tonic for the soul.