A Lamentation of Queen Elizabeth

Sir Thomas More

Written 1503; Published 1557

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O ye that put your trust and confidence

    In worldly joy and frail prosperity,

That so live here as ye should never hence,

    Remember death and look here upon me.

    Ensample I think there may no better be.

        Your self wot well that in this realm was I

        Your queen but late, and lo now here I lie.

Was I not born of old worthy lineage?

   Was not my mother queen, my father king?

Was I not a king’s fere in marriage?

   Had I not plenty of every pleasant thing?

   Merciful God, this is a strange reckoning:

     Riches, honour, wealth and ancestry

     Hath me forsaken, and lo now here I lie.

If worship might have kept me, I had not gone.

   If wit might have me saved, I needed not fear.

If money might have holp, I lacked none.

   But O good God what vaileth all this gear?

   When death is come, thy mighty messenger,

      Obey we must, there is no remedy;

      Me hath he summoned, and lo here I lie.

Yet was I late promised otherwise,

    This year to live in wealth and delice.

Lo whereto cometh they blandishing promise,

   O false astrology and divinatrice,

   Of God’s secrets making thy self so wise!

      How true is for this year thy prophecy!

      The year yet lasteth, and lo now here I lie.

By: Tracy L. Havill                                        Click next page to read the rest of the poem