Love, banish'd Heaven, on earth was held in scorn
Wand'ring abroad in need and beggary;
And wanting friends, though of a goddess born,
Yet crav'd the alms of such as passed by:
I, like a man devout and charitable,
Clothed the naked, lodg'd this wand'ring Guest;
With sighs and tears still furnishing his table,
With what might make the miserable blest.
But this Ungrateful, for my good desert,
Intic'd my thoughts against me to conspire,
Who gave consent to steal away my heart;
And set my breast, his lodging, on a firc.
Well, well my friends! when beggars grow thus bold
No marvel, then, though charity grow cold!
Since there's no help, come, let us kiss and part !
Nay, I have done; you get no more of me:
And I am glad, yea glad with all my heart,
That thus so cleanly I myself can free.
Shake hands for ever; cancel all our vows;
And, when we meet at any time again,
Be it not seen, in either of our brows,
That we one jot of former love retain !
Now, at the last gasp of Love's latest breath,
When, his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies:
When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death ;
And Innocence is closing up her eyes;
Now, if thou would'st, when all have given him
From death to life, thou might'st him yet recover
Bid me discourse, I will enchant thine car,
Or, like a fairy trip upon the green,
Or, like a nymph, with long dishevell'd hair,
Dance on the sand, and yet no footing seen
Love is a spirit all compact of fire,
Not gross to sink, but light, and will aspire.
Witness this primrose bank whereon I lie;
These forceless flowers like sturdy trees support me;
Two strengthless doves will draw me through the sky,
From morn to night, even where I list to sport me :
Is love so light, sweet boy, and may it be
That thou should'st think it heavy unto thee?
On a day (alack the day!)
Love, whose month is ever May,
Spied a blossom, passing fair,
Playing in the wonton air:
Through the velvet leaves the wind,
All unseen, 'gan passage find;
That the lover, sick to death,
Wish'd himself the heaven's-breath.
Air, quoth he, thy checks may blow
Air, would I might triumph so!
But, alack, my hand is sworn,
Ne'er to pluck thee from thy thorn:
Vow, alack, for youth unmect;
Youth so apt to pluck a sweet.
Do not call it sin in me,
That I am forsworn to thee;
Thou for whom Jove would swear,
Juno but an Ethiop were;
And deny himself for Jove,
Turning mortal for thy love,
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends, with the remover to remove:
O no! It is an ever fixed mark,
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken ;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken. Love's not 'Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out, e'en to the edge of doom.
If this be error, and upon me proved,
I never writ, and no man ever lov'd.
From you have I been absent in the spring,
When proud pied April, dress'd in all his trim,
Had put a spirit of youth in every thing,
That heavy Saturn laugh'd and leap'd with him.
Yet, nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell
Of different flowers in odour and in hue,
Could make me any summer-story tell,
Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew,
Nor did I wonder at the lilies white,
Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose--
They were but sweet, but figures of delight,
Drawn after you, you pattern of all those.
Yet scein'd in winter still, and you away.
As with your shadow I with these did play.
The forward violet thus did I chide:
Sweet thief, whence did thou steal thy sweetest smells
If not from my love's breath? The purple pride
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells,
In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed.
The lily I condemned for thy hand,
And buds of marjoraın had stol'n thy hair:
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand,
One blushing shame, another white despair;
A third, not red nor white, had stol'n from both,
And to his robbery had annex'd thy breath ;
But for his theft, in pride of all his growth,
A vengeful canker eat him up to death.
More flowers I noted, yet I none could see
But sweet or colour it had stolen from thee.
Born about 1565, died about 1627.
He that truly loves,
Burns out the day in idle fantasies;
And when the lamb, bleating, doth bid good night
Unto the closing day, then tears begin
To keep quick time unto the owl, whose voice
Shrieks like the bell-man in the lover's car.
Love's eye the jewel of sleep, oh, seldom wears ;
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