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Of my love's conquest, peerless beauty's prize,
Adorned with honour, love, and chastity?
Even this verse, vowed to eternity,
Shall be thereof immortal monument,
And tell her praise to all posterity,

That may admire such world's rare wonderment ;
The happy purchase of my glorious spoil,
Gotten at last with labour, and long toil.

Fresh Spring, the herald of Love's mighty king,
In whose coat-armour richly are displayed
All sorts of flowers the which on earth do spring,
In goodly colours gloriously arrayed,

Go to my love, where she is careless laid,
Yet in her winter's bower not well awake:
Tell her the joyous time will not be stayed,
Unless she do him by the forelock take;
Bid her therefore her self soon ready make,
To wait on Love amongst his lovely crew,
Where every one that misseth then her make
Shall be by him amerced with penance due.

Make haste therefore, sweet love, while it is prime,
For none can call again the passéd time.

Being myself captivéd here in care,

My heart (whom none with servile bands can tie,
But the fair tresses of your golden hair),
Breaking his prison, forth to you doth fly.
Like as a bird, that in one's hand doth spy
Desiréd food, to it doth make his flight,
Even so my heart, that wont on your fair eye
To feed his fill, flies back unto your sight.
Do you him take, and in your bosom bright
Gently encage, that he may be your thrall:
Perhaps he there may learn, with rare delight,
To sing your name and praises over all:

That it hereafter may you not repent,
Him lodging in your bosom to have lent.

Since I did leave the presence or my love,
Many long weary days I have outworn,
And many nights, that slowly seemed to move
Their sad protract, from even until morn.
For, when as day the heaven doth adorn,
I wish that night the noyous day would end:
And when as night hath us of light forlorn,
I wish that day would shortly re-ascend.
Thus I the time with expectation spend,
And feign my grief with changes to beguile,
That further seems his term still to extend,
And maketh every minute seem a mile.

So sorrow still doth seem too long to last;
But joyous hours do fly away too fast.

Like as the culver, on the baréd bough
Sits mourning for the absence of her mate,
And in her songs sends many a wishful vow
For his return, that seems to linger late;

So I alone, now left disconsolate,
Mourn to myself the absence of my love:

And wandering here and there all desolate,

Seek with my plaints to match that mournful dove:
Ne joy of aught that under heaven doth hove,
Can comfort me, but her own joyous sight,
Whose sweet aspect both God and man can move,
In her unspotted pleasaunce to delight.

Dark is my day, whiles her fair light I miss,
And dead my life that wants such lively bliss.

B. GRIFFIN.

["Fidessa, more chaste than kind." 1596.]

FAIR is my love that feeds among the lilies,
The lilies growing in that pleasant garden,
Where Cupid's mount, that well-belovéd hill is,

And where that little god himself is warden.
See, where my love sits in the beds of spices,
Beset all round with camphor, myrrh, and roses,
And interlaced with curious devices,

Which her from all the world apart incloses. There doth she tune her lute for her delight,

And with sweet music makes the ground to move,

Whilst I (poor I) do sit in heavy plight

Wailing alone my unrespected love; Not daring rush into so rare a place, That gives to her and she to it a grace.

I have not spent the April of my time,

The sweet of youth in plotting in the air:

But do at first adventure seek to climb,

Whilst flowers of blooming years are green and fair.

I am no leaving of all-withering age,

I have not suffered many winter lowers;

I feel no storm, unless my love do rage,

And then in grief I spend both days and hours.

This yet doth comfort, that my flower lasted,

Until it did approach my Sun too near;
And then (alas) untimely was it blasted,
So soon as once thy beauty did appear:
But after all my comfort rests in this,
That for thy sake my youth decayéd is.

Sweet stroke, (so might I thrive) as I must praise,
But sweeter hand that gives so sweet a stroke:
The lute itself is sweetest, when she plays;

But what hear I? A string through fear is broke. The lute doth shake, as if it were afraid,

O sure some goddess holds it in her hand!
A heavenly power that oft hath me dismayed,
Yet such a power as doth in beauty stand.
Cease, lute; my ceaseless suit will ne'er be heard:
(Ah! too hard-hearted she that will not hear it!)
If I but think on joy, my joy is marred,

My grief is great, yet ever must I bear it.
But love 'twixt us will prove a faithful page,
And she will love my sorrows to assuage.

Weep now no more, mine eyes, but be you drowned
In your own tears, so many years distilled :
And let her know that at them long hath frowned,
That you can weep no more, although she willed.
This hap her cruelty hath her allotten,

Who whilom was commandress of each part:
That now her proper griefs must be forgotten,
By those true outward signs of inward smart.
For how can he that hath not one tear left him,

Stream out those floods that's due unto her moaning,
When both of eyes and tears she hath bereft him?
O yet I'll signify my grief with groaning!
True sighs, true groans shall echo in the air,
And say Fidessa (though most cruel) is most fair.

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