Farewell, sweet Cooke-ham, where I first obtained
Grace from that grace where perfect grace remained;
And where the muses gave their full consent,
I should have power the virtuous to content;
Where princely palace willed me to indite,
The sacred story of the soul’s delight.
The poem begins with the speaker’s (Lanyer’s) departure from the paradisiacal estate of Cooke-ham, where she was blessed with both the “Grace” of God and that of her “grace” Margaret Clifford, Countess of Cumberland. It was also in Cooke-ham that the poet’s muses have granted her “full consent” to compose this piece, and the countess (“princely palace”) commissioned her to “indite,” or write, a “sacred story” (a reference to “Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum,” a poem about the Passion of the Christ, from the same book). The opening lines indicate that the poem (beginning with a “[f]arewell”) is narrated from the vantage point of a speaker who has left, and looks back on, her days at Cooke-ham. Note also the extensive use of repetition (e.g., “Grace”) and alliteration (e.g., “princely palace,” “sacred story of the soul’s delight”) in these lines and throughout the rest of the poem.
Where being seated, you might plainly see
Hills, vales, and woods, as if on bended knee
They had appeared, your honor to salute,
Or to prefer some strange unlooked-for suit;
All interlaced with brooks and crystal springs,
A prospect fit to please the eyes of kings.
And thirteen shires appeared all in your sight,
Europe could not afford much more delight.
The speaker describes the beautiful panoramic view of Cooke-ham that the countess enjoyed upon her arrival at the estate. “Hills, vales, and woods,” like human beings, “salute” the countess “as if on bended knee” and bring their requests (“some strange unlooked-for suit”) to her as if to a monarch. Here, the poem engages in pathetic fallacy, a kind of personification which attributes to nonhuman entities the ability to empathize with human emotion (in these lines, the estate’s admiration for the countess). Lanyer then suggests that the countess not only claims ownership of the Cooke-ham estate, but that her authority also extends to masculine spaces of power (“A prospect fit to please the eyes of kings”), and from the provincial to the continental (“And thirteen shires appeared all in your sight, / Europe could not afford much more delight”).
Unconstant Fortune, thou art most to blame,
Who casts us down into so low a frame
Where our great friends we cannot daily see,
So great a difference is there in degree.
Many are placed in those orbs of state,
Parters in honor, so ordained by Fate,
Nearer in show, yet farther off in love,
In which, the lowest always are above.
Fortune (personified) is blamed as the entity responsible for Lanyer’s separation from the Cliffords. The repeated adjective “great” captures the class distinction that jeopardizes the Clifford-Lanyer relationship: not only are the countess and her daughter “great” (Line 105) as friends of virtue and hospitality, but they are also “great” (Line 106) because of their “difference [...] in degree” from the poet, who is financially unstable and lacking an aristocratic background. Lanyer observes that many of her friends in honorific ranks (“orbs of state”) are “ordained by Fate” to become “[p]arters,” or separators, who break and leave relationships. The expression “the lowest always are above” borrows from the Biblical notion that the poor and lowly are above the great in spiritual worth—a sentiment relevant to the frustration Lanyer’s speaker expresses upon losing her friends “above” her in the social hierarchy. Note also that the word “fortune” can refer not only to luck, but also to a large amount of money.
To this fair tree, taking me by the hand,
You did repeat the pleasures which had passed,
Seeming to grieve they could no longer last.
And with a chaste, yet loving kiss took leave,
Of which sweet kiss I did it soon bereave,
Scorning a senseless creature should possess
So rare a favor, so great happiness.
Leaving Cooke-ham, the countess bids farewell to her favorite oak tree with “a chaste, yet loving kiss.” Notice the speaker’s pathetic fallacy when she describes the tree as though it were a human being monopolizing the countess’s affection. Jealous of the oak, the speaker goes on to “bereave,” or take away, the kiss, and points out that the lucky tree is only a “senseless creature”—as if to argue that she herself, the sentient creature, were more deserving of the sign of intimacy. Could Lanyer be hinting towards unfulfilled homosocial or homoerotic desire in this final exchange?
This last farewell to Cooke-ham here I give,
When I am dead thy name in this may live,
Wherein I have performed her noble hest
Whose virtues lodge in my unworthy breast,
And ever shall, so long as life remains,
Tying my life to her by those rich chains.
The poem circles back to its beginning, the “farewell.” As her speaker reluctantly leaves Cooke-ham, Lanyer suggests that her poetry will outlive her, and that the countess will especially live on in her work (“When I am dead thy name in this may live”). Issues of inheritance, property, and social class enter the poem once again as the speaker describes the countess’s “virtues” as a visitor “lodg[ing] in [her] unworthy breast.” Unlike the illustrious Cooke-ham estate, the speaker is “unworthy,” worthy only when performing the “hest” (commission) of a noblewoman. The final line expresses a desire to remain closely attached to the countess’s virtue (“those rich chains”) and perhaps also to her capital (“those rich chains”).
