Lament

I happened on this verse of William Dunbar's 1509 poem, Lament for the Makers and it took my breath away with the memories it brought with it. Perhaps you have to have been an English major or at any rate to have the rich associations I have with the works of Chaucer, the flower of all makers, of Lydgate, the Monk of Bury, and of Gower to feel the impact of the poem. "He" is death:

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He hes done petuously devour,

The noble Chaucer, of makaris flour,

The Monk of Bery, and Gower, all thre;

Timor mortis conturbat me.

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