Sir Walter Raleigh lived from 1552 to 1618 and shows up in many movies as the lover of Queen Elizabeth I. Certainly the two had a quite close relationship, and when he snuck off to marry another woman she tossed him into the Tower of London. He was a true renaissance man. He was an explorer, a poet, a courtly gentleman, and much more.
In Raleigh's poem "A Vision upon this Conceit of the Fairy Queen" it is intriguing, because he is commenting on Spenser's The Fairy Queen, which is about Queen Elizabeth.
Methought I saw the grave where Laura lay,
Within that temple where the vestal flame
Was wont to burn; and, passing by that way,
To see that buried dust of living fame,
Whose tomb fair Love and fairer Virtue kept,
All suddenly I saw the Fairy Queen,
At whose approach the soul of Petrarch wept;
And from thenceforth those graces were not seen,
For they this Queen attended; in whose stead
Oblivion laid him down on Laura's hearse.
Hereat the hardest stones were seen to bleed,
And groans of buried ghosts the heavens did pierce :
Where Homer's spright did tremble all for grief,
And cursed the access of that celestial thief.
There is no "Laura" in The Fairy Queen, and as The Fairy Queen is reputed to be one of the longest poems in the English Language, it's a bit challenging to casually read that poem in order to see how this poem relates to it. So let's just take it as a stand-alone work, to see how it feels to us as readers.
So we have a tomb of Laura, a woman who is treasured. And then we have a Fairy Queen approaching. Suddenly there is sadness and agony - stones were bleeding, ghosts were groaning.
July - A Poem A Day
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