LIKE an adventurous seafarer am I,
Who hath some long and dangerous voyage
And called to tell of his discovery,
How far he sailed, what countries he had
Proceeding from the port whence he put forth,
Shows by his compass how his course he steered;
When east, when west, when south, and when by north,
As how the pole to every place was reared, What capes he doubled, of what continent, The gulfs and straits that strangely he had passed,
Where most becalméd, where with foul breath
And on what rocks in peril to be cast:
Thus in my love, time calls me to relate
My tedious travels and oft varying fate.
My heart was slain, and none but you and I;
Who should I think the murder should commit ?
Since but yourself there was no creature by,
But only I, guiltless of murdering it.
It slew itself; the verdict on the view
Do quit the dead,, and me not accessory:
Well, well, I fear it will be proved, by you
The evidence so great a proof doth carry.
But ́O, see, see, we need enquire no further,
Upon your lips the scarlet drops are found,
And in your eye the boy that did the murther,
Your cheeks yet pale, since first he gave the wound.
By this I see, however things be past,
Yet Heaven will still have murder out at last.
TAKING my pen, with words to cast my woe,
Duly to count the sum of all my cares,
I find my griefs innumerable grow,
The reckonings rise to millions of despairs;
And thus, dividing of my fatal hours,
The payments of my love I read and cross;
Subtracting, set my sweets unto my sours,
My joy's arrearage leads me to my loss:
And thus, mine eyes a debtor to thine eye
Which by extortion gaineth all their looks,
My heart hath paid such grievous usury,
That all their wealth lies in thy beauty's books;
And all is thine which hath been due to me,
And I a bankrupt, quite undone by thee.
BRIGHT star of beauty, on whose eyelids sit
A thousand nymph-like and enamoured graces,
The goddesses of Memory and Wit
Which there in order take their several places;
In whose dear bosom sweet delicious Love
Lays down his quiver, which he once did bear,
Since he that blesséd Paradise did prove,
And leaves his mother's lap to sport him there:
Let others strive to entertain with words,
My soul is of a braver metal made;
I hold that vile which vulgar wit affords;
In me's that faith which time cannot invade.
Let what I praise be still made good by you:
Be you most worthy whilst I am most true.
NOTHING but No and I, and I and No:
How falls it out so strangely you reply?
I tell you, fair, I'll not be answered so,
With this affirming No, denying I.
I say, I love, you slightly answer I :
I say, you love, you pule me out a No:
I say, I die, you echo me with I:
Save me! I cry, you sigh me out a No.
Must woe and I have nought but No and I?
No I, am I, if I no more can have;
Answer no more, with silence make reply,
And let me take myself what I do crave:
Let No and I with I and you be so :
Then answer No and I, and I and No.
How many paltry, foolish, painted things
That now in coaches trouble every street,
Shall be forgotten, whom no poet sings,
Ere they be well wrapped in their winding-sheet?
Where I to thee eternity shall give
When nothing else remaineth of these days,
And Queens hereafter shall be glad to live
Upon the alms of thy superfluous praise.
Virgins and matrons reading these my rhymes,
Shall be so much delighted with thy story,
That they shall grieve they lived not in these times,
To have seen thee, their sex's only glory :
So shalt thou fly above the vulgar throng,
Still to survive in my immortal song.
LOVE in a humour played the prodigal,
And bade my senses to a solemn feast;
Yet more to grace the company withal,
Invites my heart to be the chiefest guest:
No other drink would serve this glutton's turn
But precious tears distilling from mine eyne,
Which with my sighs this epicure doth burn,
Quaffing carouses in this costly wine;
Where, in his cups o'ercome with foul excess,
Straightways he plays a swaggering ruffian's part,
And at the banquet in his drunkenness
Slew his dear friend, my kind and truest heart;
A gentle warning, friends, thus may you see,
What 'tis to keep a drunkard company.
THERE'S nothing grieves me but that age should haste,
That in my days I may not see thee old,
That where those two clear sparkling eyes are placed,
Only two loopholes then I might behold.
That lovely archéd, ivory polished brow,
Defaced with wrinkles that I might but see;
Thy dainty hair, so curled and crispéd now,
Like grizzled moss upon some aged tree;
Thy cheek, now flush with roses, sunk and lean,
Thy lips, with age, as any wafer thin,
Thy pearly teeth out of thy head so clean,
That when thou feedest thy nose shall touch thy chin: These lines that now thou scorn'st, which should
Then would I make thee read but to despite thee.
As other men, so I myself do muse
Why in this sort I wrest invention so,
And why these giddy metaphors I use,
Leaving the path the greater part do go;
I will resolve you: I am lunatic,
And ever this in madmen you shall find,
What they last thought of when the brain grew sick, In most distraction they keep that in mind.
Thus talking idly in this bedlam fit,
Reason and I, you must conceive, are twain,
'Tis nine years now since first I lost my wit,
Bear with me then, though troubled be my brain : With diet and correction men distraught,
Not too far past, may to their wits be brought.
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