To Mistress Margaret Hussey
Merry Margaret,
As midsummer flower,
Light as a falcon
Or hawk of the tower:
With solace and gladness,
A lot mirth and no insanity,
All good and no badness;
So joyously,
So maidenly,
So womanly
Her demeaning
In each factor,
Far, far passing
That I can indite,
Or suffice to put in writing
Of Merry Margaret
As midsummer flower,
Light as falcon
Or hawk of the tower.
As affected person and nonetheless
And as full of fine will
As truthful Isaphill,
Coriander,
Candy pomander,
Good Cassander,
Steadfast of thought,
Effectively made, properly wrought,
Far could also be sought
Ere that ye can discover
So courteous, so type
As Merry Margaret,
This midsummer flower,
Light as falcon
Or hawk of the tower.
John Skelton (c.1463-1529) turned a tutor to the longer term King Henry VIII and, after taking holy orders, he was the rector of Diss, Norfolk, till his loss of life. He stands among the many most partaking and authentic of the Early Fashionable poets.
The gathering of dialogues and lyrics the place the tribute to Margaret Hussey first appeared was described by its writer as “a proper delectable treatise upon a goodly Garland or Chaplet of Laurel, devised by Grasp Skelton, Poet Laureate”. The Garland of Laurel, because it’s extra succinctly recognized, is a “dream imaginative and prescient” (see the Poetry Basis’s wonderful essay) wherein, writing in his mid-30s, Skelton is aided by varied allegorical figures comparable to Occupation and Fame, in a midlife reassessment. “Poeta Skelton” provides a sufficiently good account of himself to be awarded a powerful laurel-wreath, labored in silver, gold and pearls by the Countess of Surrey and her court docket women. The Garland concludes with a poem devoted to every of the women so as of rank.
Skelton’s frequent apply of dimeter and trimeter traces assembled in stretches of monorhyme bequeathed us with the time period Skeltonics. Though he was much more metrically versatile than the designation suggests, and The Garland of Laurel itself shows his mastery of assorted metre and verse constructions, the “Skeltonic” fashion brightly captures the temper of the poet in his triumph and the spirit of “Merry Margaret” herself. She is usually characterised by means of simile: the midsummer flower, the collection of aromatic herbs within the final stanza. Probably the most fascinating comparability, at first sight, is with the falcon and the “hawk of the tower”. Is Skelton suggesting she is perhaps a predator, or a minimum of somebody who can ship a pointy verbal rebuke from a lofty top? It’s in all probability unlikely: the Garland wasn’t an applicable event for Skelton the satirist to mock at courtly behaviour. The birds of prey owned by the the Aristocracy conformed to civilised guidelines, in any case, and, a minimum of of their relations with their homeowners, had been docile. Margaret Hussey is clearly not a menace, not a lady of extremes. Maybe, although, there’s a suggestion that she has been tamed?
Regardless of her readiness for mirth, Hussey is “As affected person and nonetheless / And as full of fine will / As truthful Isaphill”, a possible reference to Hypsipyle, a heroic and long-suffering legendary Queen of Lemnos. Within the pleasantly scented bunching of “Corander, / Candy pomander / Good Cassander” that follows, “Good Cassander” combines the virtues of the Trojan priestess with these of the cinnamon-like spice, Cassia. The title “Mistress” denotes that Hussey was a married lady, though, in keeping with the poem, she was additionally “maidenly”. Such an plentiful checklist of virtues appears to stretch the bounds of chance, but Skelton’s genial buoyancy by some means retains all of the discordant potentialities in play. We droop our disbelief, and take his phrase for it that Margaret Hussey absolutely deserved her eulogy.
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