Madness his sorrow, gout his cramp may he Make, by but thinking who hath made them such: And may he feel no touch Of conscience, but of fame, and be The world's whole sap is sunk: The general balm th' hydroptic earth hath drunk, Anguish'd, not that 't was sin, but that 't was she: Compar'd with me, who am their epitaph. Or may he for her virtue reverence One, that hates him only for impotence, And equal traitors be she and his sense. May he dream treason, and believe that he Meant to perform it, and confess, and die, And no record tell why: His sons, which none of his may be, Inherit nothing but his infamy: Or may he so long parasites have fed, Study me then, you who shall lovers be In whom love wrought new alchymy. A quintessence even from nothingness, That he would fain be theirs, whom he hath bred, Of absence, darkness, death; things which art not. And at the last be circumcis'd for bread. All others from all things draw all that's good, Drown'd the whole world, us two; oft did we grow Care to aught else; and often absences But I am by her death (which word wrongs her) I needs must know; I should prefer, Some ends, some means; yea plants, yea stones detest, And love, all, all some properties invest. If I an ordinary nothing were, As shadow, a light, and body must be here. But I am none; nor will my sun renew! Since she enjoys her long night's festival, WITCHCRAFT BY A PICTURE. I FIX,mine eye on thine, and there Hadst thou the wicked skill, By pictures made and marr'd, to kill; But now I've drunk thy sweet salt tears, That I can be endamag'd by that art: One picture more, yet that will be, THE BAIT. COME, live with me, and be my love, nd we will some new pleasures prove Of golden sands, and crystal brooks, With silken lines and silver hooks. There will the river whisp'ring run, When thou wilt swim in that live bath, If thou to be so seen art loath By Sun or Moon, thou darken'st both; Let others freeze with angling reeds, Let coarse bold hands from slimy nest For thee, thou need'st no such deceit, Who will believe me, if I swear Who would not laugh at me, if I should say, Ah! what a trifle is a heart, If once into Love's hands it come! All other griefs allow a part To other griefs, and ask themselves but some. They come to us, but us Love draws, He swallows us and never chaws: By him, as by chain'd shot, whole ranks do die; He is the tyrant pike, and we the fry. If 't were not so, what did become Of my heart, when I first saw thee? I brought a heart into the room, But from the room I carried none with me: Mine would have taught thine heart to show Yet nothing can to nothing fall, Nor any place be empty quite, Therefore I think my breast hath all Those pieces still, though they do not unite: And now as broken glasses show A hundred lesser faces, so My rags of heart can like, wish, and adore, But after one such love can love no more. THE APPARITION. WHEN by thy scorn, O murd'ress, I am dead, Of all solicitation from me, Then shall my ghost come to thy bed, And thee feign'd vestal in worse arms shall see; And in a false sleep even from thee shrink. What I will say, I will not tell thee now, Lest that preserve thee: and since my love is spent, THE BROKEN HEART. He is stark mad, whoever says.. Yet not that love so soon decays, But that it can ten in less space devour; VALEDICTION FORBIDDING MOURNING. As virtuous men pass mildly away, So let us melt, and make no noise, No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move, "T were profanation of our joys To tell the laity our love. Moving of th' Earth brings harms and fears, Dull sublunary lovers' love (Whose soul is sense) cannot admit Of absence, 'cause it doth remove The thing which clemented it. But we by a love so far refin'd, Careless eyes, lips, and hands, to miss. Our two souls therefore, which are one, Though I must go, endure not yet A breach, but an expansion, Like gold to airy thinness beat. If they be two, they are two so And though it in the centre sit, Yet when the other far doth roam, It leans and hearkens after it, And grows erect, as that comes home. Such wilt thou be to me, who must, Like th' other foot, obliquely run, Thy firmness makes my circle just, And makes me end where I begun. THE ECSTASY. WHERE, like a pillow on a bed, A pregnant bank swell'd up, to rest The violet's declining head, Sat we on one another's breast. Our hands were firmly cemented By a fast balm, which thence did spring, Was all the means to make us one, Our souls (which, to advance our state, That he souls' language understood, And part far purer than he came. This ecstasy doth unperplex (We said) and tell us what we love, We see by this, it was not sex, We see, we saw not what did move : But as all several souls contain Mixture of things they know not what, The strength, the colour, and the size That abler soul, which thence doth flow, Defects of loveliness controls. We then, who are this new soul, know, Are soul, whom no change can invade. But, O, alas! so long, so far Our bodies why do we forbear? Nor are dross to us, but allay. On man Heaven's influence works not so, Though it to body first repair. That subtle knot, which makes us man; Have heard this dialogue of one, Small change, when we 're to bodies grown. LOVE'S DEITY. I LONG to talk with some old lover's ghost, I must love her that loves not me. Sure they, which made him god, meant not so much, But every modern god will now extend Rebel and atheist too, why murmur I As though I felt the worst that Love could do? LOVE'S DIET. To what a cumbersome unwieldiness And burthenous corpulence my love had grown; But that I did, to make it less, And keep it in proportion, Give it a diet, made it feed upon, That which love worst endures, discretion. Above one sigh a-day I allow'd him not, Of which my fortune and my faults had part; If he wrung from me a tear, I brin'd it so Whatever she would dictate, I writ that, Convey'd by this, ah! what doth it avail Thus I reclaim'd my buzzard love to fly At what, and when, and how, and where I chose ; Now negligent of sport I lie, And now, as other falc'ners use, I spring a mistress, swear, write, sigh, and weep, And the game kill'd, or lost, go talk or sleep. I give my reputation to those Which were my friends; mine industry to foes: To Nature all that I in rhyme have writ; To him, for whom the passing-bell next tolls, Therefore I'll give no more, but I'll undo Thou, Love, taught'st me, by making me Love her, who doth neglect both me and thee, T' invent and practise this one way, t' annihilate all three. THE WILL. BEFORE I sign my last gasp, let me breathe, Thou, Love, hast taught me heretofore My constancy I to the planets give; My truth to them who at the court do live; To Jesuits; to buffoons my pensiveness; My money to a capuchin. Thou, Love, taugh'st me, by appointing me To love there, where no love receiv'd can be, Only to give to such as have no good capacity. My faith I give to Roman Catholics; All my good works unto the schismatics And courtship to an university: My patience let gamesters share. Be more than woman, she would get above Live, primrose, then, and thrive And women, whom this flower doth represent, Belongs unto each woman, then Each woman may take half us men: Or if this will not serve their turn, since all Numbers are odd or even, since they fall First into five, women may take us all. THE RELIQUE. WHEN my grave is broke up again ́ (For graves have learn'd that woman-head, And he that digs it, spies A bracelet of bright hair about the bone, And think that there a loving couple lies? If this fall in a time, or land, All women shall adore us, and some men; |