The Birth of Merlin

A dark enigma to the memory. Image credit Littlestone

…and when you die, I will erect a monument,
Upon the verdant plains of Salisbury,
No king shall have so high a sepulchre,
With pendulous stones, that I will hang by art,
Where neither lime nor mortar shall be used,
A dark enigma to the memory,
For none shall have the power to number them;
A place that I will hallow for your rest;
Where no night-hag shall walk, nor were-wolf tread,
Where Merlin’s mother shall be sepulchred.

William Rowley (1690–1768) and also occasionally ascribed to Shakespeare.

 

Merlin, in William Rowley’s The Birth of Merlin, suggests to his mother that she should ‘retire to a solitude’ that he has made ready for her, “…to weep away the flesh you have offended with…”