Delight in Disorder

Robert Herrick

Teacher card

Published: 1648, in Hesperides and Noble Numbers
Length: 14 lines, 74 words, 1 word in 6 is long
Year band: Reading load: Years 9–10. A guide from word length, not a curriculum level.
Themes: love
Time: 5–10 min, depending on the activity

The text

A sweet disorder in the dressKindles in clothes a wantonness:A lawn about the shoulders thrownInto a fine distraction:An erring lace which here and thereEnthralls the crimson stomacher:A cuff neglectful, and therebyRibbons to flow confusedly:A winning wave, deserving note,In the tempestuous petticoat:A careless shoe-string, in whose tieI see a wild civility:Do more bewitch me than when artIs too precise in every part.

Robert Herrick (died 1674), Hesperides and Noble Numbers (1648), lines 1551–1564 of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421. Public domain in Australia: the author died before 1955. Copied word for word and checked against the ebook.

What to do with it

One link and one task line for each activity. Send a student the one you want them to do, or print this page and hand it round; each link has a QR code.

Its lines are dealt for names in posy cardsin posy · 14 lines · about 5–10 min
Task for students (you can change the sentence before you print; nothing is saved)See how posy takes lines from this poem, then make a card for someone using them.
See how posy takes lines from this poem, then make a card for someone using them.
posy.popplepoetry.com/sources#he-disorder

Send the whole hand-out

This page’s link. Students open it, read the text and pick what to do; nothing asks them to sign in.

Link for the whole text

https://popplepoetry.com/find/herrick-delight-in-disorder · popplepoetry.com