The Complete Poems of Richard Barnfield/Poems/Sonnet 2

by Richard Barnfield

For other versions of this work, see Sonnet 2: Against the Dispraysers of Poetrie.

SONNET II.

Against the Dispraysers of Poetrie.

Chaucer is dead; and Gower lyes in graue;
The Earle of Surrey, long agoe is gone;
Sir Philip Sidneis soule, the Heauens haue;
George Gascoigne him beforne, was tomb'd in stone.
Yet, tho their Bodies lye full low in ground,
(As euery thing must dye, that earst was borne)
Their liuing fame, no Fortune can confound;
Nor euer shall their Labours be forlorne.
And you, that discommend sweete Poetrie,
(So that the Subiect of the same be good)
Here may you see, your fond simplicitie;
Sith Kings haue fauord it, of royall Blood.
The King of Scots (now liuing) is a Poet,
As his Lepatno, and his Furies shoe it.