At the round earth's imagined corners, blow
Your trumpets, angels, and arise, arise
From death, you numberless infinities
Of souls, and to your scattered bodies go,
All whom the flood did, and fire shall, o'erthrow,
All whom war, dearth, age, agues, tyrannies,
Despair, law, chance, hath slain, and you whose eyes,
Shall behold God, and never taste death's woe.
But let them sleep, Lord, and me mourn a space;
For, if above all these, my sins abound,
'Tis late to ask abundance of thy grace,
When we are there. Here on this lowly ground,
Teach me how to repent; for that's as good
As if thou hadst seal'd my pardon with thy blood.
The adverb ‘there’ is ambiguous, meaning ‘there’ at the apocalypse or ‘there’ in hell — or both. Also ‘there’ is juxtaposed with ‘here’ — the important contrast of two extremes; one relating to God’s terrible judgment and its outcome for each person, and the other relating to the ‘lowly ground’ of humans who struggle on this earth.
At the round earths imagined corners Holy Sonnet 7