The Phoenix and the Turtle by William Shakespeare
and A Funeral Elegy by W.S.
I finish out this incredible year long challenge with two poems. One by the Bard and one that for a time was thought to be by him, but most scholars have now determined it is decidedly not Shakespeare.
The Phoenix and the Turtle...
no not THAT turtle, 
yes, THAT turtle (as in dove). 
Is an allegorical poem depicting the death of ideal love in the form of two birds.
"Reason, in itself confounded,
Saw division grow together,
To themselves yet either neither,
Simple were so well compounded;"
Other birds are mentioned (eagle, swan, crow)
at the funeral of the two who:
"Beauty, truth and rarity,
Grace in all simplicity,
Here enclos'd, in cinders lie."
A Funeral Elegy by W.S. was attributed to Shakespeare for a short time in the late 1980's early 1990's through a computer program analysis but scholars have since debunked that analysis. The creator of the Shakespeare 2020 Project acknowledges this and in hindsight would not have included it.
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