1     Lord, who createdst man in wealth and store,
2         Though foolishly he lost the same,
3             Decaying more and more,
4                 Till he became
5                     Most poore:
6                     With thee
7                 O let me rise
8             As larks, harmoniously,
9         And sing this day thy victories:
10   Then shall the fall further the flight in me.

11   My tender age in sorrow did beginne
12       And still with sicknesses and shame.
13           Thou didst so punish sinne,
14               That I became
15                   Most thinne.
16                   With thee
17               Let me combine,
18           And feel thy victorie:
19           For, if I imp my wing on thine,
20   Affliction shall advance the flight in me.

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Composition Date:

not known.

Form:

ababacdcdc. Pattern or concrete poem. The two stanzas are set side-by-side on opposing pages, lengthwise down the page. The reader must turn the book counterclockwise, so that right-hand page is at the top, and the left-hand page underneath it, in order to read the text. The two stanzas thus look like two pairs of wings in mid-flight.

1.

store: ample goods, abundance.

5.

The length of the lines decreases to reflect their content, diminished man.

10.

Herbert alludes to the paradox of the "fortunate fall" or felix culpa. Only by sinning with Eve, and being cast out of the Garden of Eden into a world of labour, pain, and death, did Adam enable the second Adam, Christ, to redeem man and show a love and forgiveness that otherwise could never have been.

18.

feel: "feel this day" in 1633. The two added words disturb the clear metrical scheme (which has six syllables in lines 3, 8, and 13) and are not found in the manuscript of the poem.

19.

imp: Herbert suggests that if he adds his feathers to God's wings, he will fly the higher because of God's might. Sometimes feathers were grafted or imped into a falcon's wing to increase the power of its flight. Note that this metaphor suggests that the wing-like stanza on one page represents Herbert's wings, and the wing-stanza on the facing page represents God's.