Because I oft in dark abstracted guise
Seem most alone in greatest company,
With dearth of words, or answers quite awry,
To them that would make speech of speech arise,

They deem, and of their doom the rumor flies,
That poison foul of bubbling pride doth lie
So in my swelling breast that only I
Fawn on myself, and others do despise:

Yet pride I think doth not my soul possess,
Which looks too oft in his unflatt'ring glass:
But one worse fault, ambition, I confess,

That makes me oft my best friends overpass,

Like some weak lords, neighbor'd by mighty kings,
To keep themselves and their chief cities free,
Do easily yield, that all their coasts may be
Ready to store their camps of needful things:

So Stella's heart finding what power Love brings,
To keep itself in life and liberty,
Doth willing grant, that in the frontiers he
Use all to help his other conquerings:

And thus her heart escapes, but thus her eyes
Serve him with shot, her lips his heralds are;
Her breasts his tents, legs his triumphal car;

Time, cruel Time, come and subdue that brow
Which conquers all but thee, and thee, too, stays
As if she were exempt from scythe or bow,
From love or years unsubject to decays.
Or art thou grown in league with those fair eyes
That they may help thee to consume our days?
Or dost thou spare her for her cruelties,
Being merciless like thee that no man weighs?
And yet thou seest thy power she disobeys,
Cares not for thee, but lets thee waste in vain,
And prodigal of hours and years betrays
Beauty and youth t'opinion and disdain.

Come Time, the anchor-hold of my desire,
My last resort whereto my hopes appeal,
Cause once the date of her disdain t'expire;
Make her the sentence of her wrath repeal.
Rob her fair Brow, break in on Beauty, steal
Power from those eyes, which pity cannot spare;
Deal with those dainty cheeks as she doth deal
With this poor heart consumed with despair;
This heart made now the prospective of care,
By loving her, the cruelst Fair that lives,
The cruelst Fair that sees I pine for her,
And never mercy to my merit gives.

His Remedy for Love

Since to obtain thee nothing will be stead,
I have a med'cine that shall cure my love,
The powder of her heart dried, when she is dead,
That gold nor honor ne'er had power to move,
Mixt with her tears, that ne'er her true-love crost
Nor at fifteen ne'er long'd to be a bride,
Boil'd with her sighs in giving up the ghost,
That for her late deceased husband died;
Into the same then let a woman breathe,
That, being chid, did never word reply,
With one thrice-married's prayers, that did bequeath

Read in my face a volume of despairs,
The wailing Iliads of my tragic woe,
Drawn with my blood and printed with my cares
Wrought by her hand, that I have honor'd so.
Who, whilst I burn, she sings at my soul's wrack,
Looking aloft from turret of her pride;
There my soul's tyrant joys her in the sack
Of her own seat, whereof I made her guide.
There do these smokes that from affliction rise,
Serve as an incense to a cruel Dame;
A sacrifice thrice grateful to her eyes,
Because their power serve to exact the same.

Fair and lovely maid, look from the shore,
See thy Leander striving in these waves,
Poor soul forespent, whose force can do no more:
Now send forth hopes, for now calm pity saves.
And waft him to thee with those lovely eyes,
A happy convoy to a holy land;
Now show thy power and where thy virtue lies;
To save thine own, stretch out the fairest hand.
Stretch out the fairest hand a pledge of peace,
That hand that darts so right and never misses;
I'll not revenge old wrongs; my wrath shall cease;

How long shall I in mine affliction mourn,
A burden to myself, distress'd in mind?
When shall my interdicted hopes return
From out despair wherein they live confin'd?
When shall her troubled brow charg'd with disdain
Reveal the treasure which her smiles impart?
When shall my faith the happiness attain
To break the ice that hath congeal'd her heart?
Unto herself, herself my love doth summon,
If love in her hath any power to move,
And let her tell me as she is a woman
Whether my faith hath not deserv'd her love.

Press'd by the Moon, mute arbitress of tides,
While the loud equinox its power combines,
The sea no more its swelling surge confines,
But o'er the shrinking land sublimely rides.
The wild blast, rising from the Western cave,
Drives the huge billows from their heaving bed;
Tears from their grassy tombs the village dead,
And breaks the silent sabbath of the grave!
With shells and sea-weed mingled, on the shore
Lo! their bones whiten in the frequent wave;
But vain to them the winds and waters rave;
They hear the warring elements no more:

Cupid, because thou shin'st in Stella's eyes,
That from her locks, thy day-nets, noe scapes free,
That those lips swell, so full of thee they be,
That her sweet breath makes oft thy flames to rise,

That in her breast thy pap well sugared lies,
That he Grace gracious makes thy wrongs, that she
What words so ere she speak persuades for thee,
That her clear voice lifts thy fame to the skies:

Thou countest Stella thine, like those whose powers
Having got up a breach by fighting well,
Cry, "Victory, this fair day all is ours."