Some, when in ryme they of their Loues doe tell, With flames and lightning their exordiums paynt: Some inuocate the Gods, some spirits of Hell, And heauen, and earth doe with their woes acquaint....
If those ten Regions, registred by Fame, By theyr ten Sibils haue the world controld, Who prophecied of Christ or ere he came, And of his blessed birth before fore-told;...
My fayre, if thou wilt register my loue, More then worlds volumes shall thereof arise; Preserue my teares, and thou thy selfe shall proue A second flood downe rayning from mine eyes....
Reading sometyme, my sorrowes to beguile, I find old Poets hylls and floods admire: One, he doth wonder monster-breeding Nyle, Another meruailes Sulphure Aetnas fire....
Letters and lynes, we see, are soone defaced, Mettles doe waste and fret with cankers rust; The Diamond shall once consume to dust, And freshest colours with foule staines disgraced....
My hart, imprisoned in a hopeless Ile, Peopled with Armies of pale iealous eyes, The shores beset with thousand secret spyes, Must passe by ayre, or else dye in exile....
Wonder of Heauen, glasse of diuinitie, Rare beautie, Natures joy, perfections Mother, The worke of that vnited Trinitie, Wherein each fayrest part excelleth other! Loues Mithridate, the purest of perfection,...
Our floods-Queene, Thames, for shyps and Swans is crowned, And stately Seuerne for her shores is praised, The christall Trent for Foords and fishe renowned, And Auons fame to Albyons Cliues is raysed....
The glorious sunne went blushing to his bed, When my soules sunne, from her fayre Cabynet, Her golden beames had now discouered, Lightning the world, eclipsed by his set....
Cupid, dumbe-Idoll, peeuish Saint of loue, No more shalt thou nor Saint nor Idoll be; No God art thou, a Goddesse shee doth proue, Of all thine honour shee hath robbed thee....
My Loue makes hote the fire whose heat is spent, The water moisture from my teares deriueth, And my strong sighes the ayres weake force reuiueth: Thus loue, tears, sighes, maintaine each one his element....
Some wits there be which lyke my method well, And say my verse runnes in a lofty vayne; Some say, I haue a passing pleasing straine, Some say that in my humour I excell....
O eyes! behold your happy Hesperus, That luckie Load-starre of eternall light, Left as that sunne alone to comfort vs, When our worlds sunne is vanisht out of sight....
My thoughts bred vp with Eagle-birds of loue, And, for their vertues I desiered to know, Vpon the nest I set them forth, to proue If they were of the Eagles kinde or no:...
Three sorts of serpents doe resemble thee; That daungerous eye-killing Cockatrice, Th' inchaunting Syren, which doth so entice, The weeping Crocodile; these vile pernicious three....
Sitting alone, loue bids me goe and write; Reason plucks backe, commaunding me to stay, Boasting that shee doth still direct the way, Els senceles loue could neuer once indite....
Those teares, which quench my hope, still kindle my desire, Those sighes, which coole my hart, are coles vnto my loue, Disdayne, Ice to my life, is to my soule a fire:...
Whilst thus mine eyes doe surfet with delight, My wofull hart, imprisond in my breast, Wishing to be trans-formd into my sight, To looke on her by whom mine eyes are blest;...
My fayre, looke from those turrets of thine eyes, Into the Ocean of a troubled minde, Where my poor soule, the Barke of sorrow, lyes, Left to the mercy of the waues and winde....
See, chaste Diana, where my harmles hart, Rouz'd from my breast, his sure and safest layre, Nor chaste by hound, nor forc'd by Hunters arte, Yet see how right he comes vnto my fayre....