HE that loves a rosy cheek,
Or a coral lip admires,
Or from star-like eyes doth seek
Fuel to maintain his fires-
As old Time makes these decay,
So his flames must waste away.
But a smooth and steadfast mind,
Gentle thoughts and calm desires, Hearts with equal love combined,
Kindle never-dying fires. Where these are not, I despise Lovely cheeks, or lips, or eyes.
No tears, Celia, now shall win
My resolved heart to return;
I have searched thy soul within,
And find nought but pride and scorn;
I have learned thy arts, and now
Can disdain as much as thou.
Some power, in my revenge, convey
That love to her I cast away!
WHEN Love, with unconfined wings, Hovers within my gates,
And my divine Althea brings
To whisper at my grates;
When I lie tangled in her hair
And fettered to her eye-
The birds that wanton in the air
Know no such liberty.
When flowing cups run swiftly round
With no allaying Thames,
Our careless heads with roses bound,
Our hearts with loyal flames;
When thirsty grief in wine we steep,
When healths and draughts go free-
Fishes, that tipple in the deep,
Know no such liberty.
When, like committed linnets I
With shriller throat shall sing
The sweetness, mercy, majesty,
And glories of my king;
When I shall voice aloud how good
He is, how great should be-
Enlarged winds, that curl the flood,
Know no such liberty.
Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage;
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage.
If I have freedom in my love,
And in my soul am free-
Angels alone, that soar above,
Enjoy such liberty.
Ask me no more where Jove bestows, When June is past, the fading rose; For, in your beauty's orient deep, These flowers, as in their causes, sleep.
Ask me no more whither do stray
The golden atoms of the day;
For, in pure love, heaven did prepare
Those powders to enrich your hair.
Ask me no more whither doth haste The nightingale when May is past; For in your sweet, dividing throat She winters, and keeps warm her note.
Ask me no more where those stars light That downwards fall in dead of night; For in your eyes they sit, and there Fixed become, as in their sphere.
Ask me no more if east or west
The Phoenix builds her spicy nest;
For unto you at last she flies,
And in your fragrant bosom dies.
THAT SHE SUNG IN HER ARBOR.
SITTING by a river's side
Where a silent stream did glide,
Muse I did of many things
That the mind in quiet brings.
I 'gan think how some men deem
Gold their god; and some esteem
Honor is the chief content
That to man in life is lent;
And some others do contend
Quiet none like to a friend.
Others hold there is no wealth
Compared to a perfect health;
Some man's mind in quiet stands
When he 's lord of many lands.
But I did sigh, and said all this
Was but a shade of perfect bliss;
And in my thoughts I did approve
Nought so sweet as is true love.
Love 'twixt lovers passeth these,
When mouth kisseth and heart 'grees WHEN, cruel fair one, I am slain
With folded arms and lips meeting,
Each soul another sweetly greeting;
For by the breath the soul fleeteth,
And soul with soul in kissing meeteth.
If love be so sweet a thing,
That such happy bliss doth bring,
Happy is love's sugared thrall;
But unhappy maidens all
Who esteem your virgin blisses
Sweeter than a wife's sweet kisses.
No such quiet to the mind
As true love with kisses kind;
But if a kiss prove unchaste,
Then is true love quite disgraced.
Though love be sweet, learn this of me,
No sweet love but honesty.
COME away, come away, Death,
And in sad cypress let me be laid!
Fly away, fly away, breath:
I am slain by a fair cruel maid.
My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,
O, prepare it;
My part of death no one so true
By thy disdain,
And, as a trophy of thy scorn,
To some old tomb am borne,
Thy fetters must their powers bequeath
To those of Death;
Nor can thy flame immortal burn,
Like monumental fires within an urn:
Thus freed from thy proud empire, I shall
prove
There is more liberty in Death than Love.
And when forsaken lovers come
To see my tomb,
Take heed thou mix not with the crowd,
And, (as a victor) proud
To view the spoils thy beauty made,
Press near my shade;
Lest thy too cruel breath or name
Should fan my ashes back into a flame,
And thou, devoured by this revengeful fire,
His sacrifice, who died as thine, expire.
But if cold earth, or marble, must
Conceal my dust,
Whilst, hid in some dark ruins, I
Dumb and forgotten lie,
The pride of all thy victory
Will sleep with me;
And they who should attest thy glory,
Will or forget or not believe this story.
Then to increase thy triumph, let me rest,
Since by thine eye slain, buried in thy breast,
THOMAS STANLEY.
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