my gray haires equall bee;
Till then, Love, let my body raigne, and let
Mee travell, sojourne, snatch, plot, have, forget,
Resume my last yeares relict: thinke that yet
We’had never met.
Let mee thinke any rivalls letter mine,
And at next nine
Keepe midnights promise; mistake by the way
The maid, and tell the Lady of that delay;
Onely let mee love none, no, not the sport
From country grasse, to comfitures of Court,
Or cities quelque choses, let report
My minde transport.
This bargaine’s good; if when I’am old, I bee
Inflam’d by thee,
If thine owne honour, or my shame, or paine,
Thou covet most, at that age thou shalt gaine.
Doe thy will then, then subject and degree,
And fruit of love, Love I submit to thee,
Spare mee till then, I’ll beare it, though she bee
One that loves mee.
LOVES DEITIE
I long to talke with some old lovers ghost,
Who dyed before the god of Love was borne:
I cannot thinke that hee, who then lov’d most,
Sunke so low, as to love one which did scorne.
But since this god produc’d a destinie,
And that vice-nature, custome, lets it be;
I must love her, that loves not mee.
Sure, they which made him god, meant not so much:
Nor he, in his young godhead practis’d it.
But when an even flame two hearts did touch,
His office was indulgently to fit
Actives to passives. Correspondencie
Only his subject was; It cannot bee
Love, till I love her, that loves mee.
But every moderne god will now extend
His vast prerogative, as far as Jove.
To rage, to lust, to write to, to commend,
All is the purlewe of the God of Love.
Oh were wee wak’ned by this Tyrannie
To ungod this child againe, it could not bee
I should love her, who loves not mee.
Rebell and Atheist too, why murmure I,
As though I felt the worst that love could doe?
Love may make me leave loving, or might trie
A deeper plague, to make her love mee too,
Which since she loves before, I’am loth to see;
Falshood is worse than hate; and that must bee
If shee whom I love, should love mee.
THE MESSAGE
Send home my long strayd eyes to mee,
Which (Oh) too long have dwelt on thee,
Yet since there they have learn’d such ill,
Such forc’d fashions,
And false passions,
That they be
Made by thee
Fit for no good sight, keep them still.
Send home my harmlesse heart againe,
Which no unworthy thought could staine,
Which if it be taught by thine
To make jestings
Of protestings,
And breake both
Word and oath,
Keepe it, for then ’tis none of mine.
Yet send me back my heart and eyes,
That I may know, and see thy lyes,
And may laugh and joy, when thou
Art in anguish
And dost languish
For some one
That will none,
Or prove as false as thou art now.
A NOCTURNALL UPON
S. LUCIES
DAY, BEING THE SHORTEST DAY
Tis the yeares midnight, and it is the dayes,
Lucies
, who scarce seaven houres herself unmaskes,
The Sunne is spent, and now his flasks
Send forth light squibs, no constant rayes;
The worlds whole sap is sunke:
The generall balme th’hydroptique earth hath drunk,
Whither, as to the beds-feet life is shrunke,
Dead and enterr’d, yet all