A Passion of my Lord of Essex

Happy were he could finish forth his fate In some unhaunted desert, where, obscure From all society, from love and hate Of worldly folk; then might he sleep secure; Then wake again, and ever give God praise, Content with hip, with haws, and bramble-berry; In contemplation passing all his days, And change of holy thoughts to make him merry; Who, when he dies, his tomb might be a bush, Where harmless Robin dwells with gentle thrush.