To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time

Robert Herrick

Teacher card

Published: 1648, in Hesperides and Noble Numbers
Length: 16 lines, 97 words, 1 word in 19 is long
Year band: Reading load: Years 5–6. A guide from word length, not a curriculum level.
Themes: birthday, love, wedding
Time: 5–10 min, depending on the activity

The text

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,Old time is still a-flying:And this same flower that smiles to-dayTo-morrow will be dying.

The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun,The higher he's a-getting,The sooner will his race be run,And nearer he's to setting.

That age is best which is the first,When youth and blood are warmer;But being spent, the worse, and worstTimes still succeed the former.

Then be not coy, but use your time,And while ye may go marry:For having lost but once your primeYou may for ever tarry.

Robert Herrick (died 1674), Hesperides and Noble Numbers (1648), lines 3947–3965 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 · 16 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-virgins

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-to-the-virgins-to-make-much-of-time · popplepoetry.com