TIME AND LOVE XXI TIME AND LOVE 1 WHEN I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced The rich proud cost of outworn buried age ; When sometime-lofty towers I see down-razed, And brass eternal slave to mortal rage; When I have seen the hungry ocean gain When I have seen such interchange of state, This thought is as a death, which cannot choose But weep to have that which it fears to lose. XXII 2 SINCE brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, But sad mortality o'ersways their power, How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea, 19 O, how shall summer's honey breath hold out O fearful meditation! Where, alack! O none, unless this miracle have might, That in black ink my love may still shine bright. Shakespeare. XXIII SECOND THOUGHTS 1 BEAUTY, Sweet Love, is like the morning dew, WHEN DAFFODILS BEGIN TO PEER 21 XXIV 2 I MUST not grieve my Love, whose eyes would read And sport, Sweet Maid, in season of these years, Lighten forth smiles to clear the clouded air, Make me to say when all my griefs are gone, XXV WHEN DAFFODILS BEGIN TO PEER WHEN daffodils begin to peer, With heigh! the doxy over the dale, Why, then comes in the sweet o' the year; The white sheet bleaching on the hedge, With heigh! the sweet birds, O, how they sing! Doth set my pugging1 tooth on edge; For a quart of ale is a dish for a king. The lark that tirra-lirra chants, With heigh! with heigh! the thrush and the jay, Are summer songs for me and my aunts, While we lie tumbling in the hay. Shakespeare. XXVI CUCKOO WHEN daisies pied and violets blue, Do paint the meadows with delight, Cuckoo, cuckoo: O word of fear, When shepherds pipe on oaten straws, And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks, And maidens bleach their summer smocks, The cuckoo then, on every tree, Mocks married men; for thus sings he, Cuckoo ; Cuckoo, cuckoo: O word of fear, Unpleasing to the married ear. 1 Thievish. Shakespeare. SPRING XXVII THE Ousel-cock, so black of hue, The throstle with his note so true, The finch, the sparrow, and the lark, The plain-song cuckoo gray, Whose note full many a man doth mark, And dares not answer nay. Shakespeare. 23 XXVIII SPRING SPRING, the sweet Spring, is the year's pleasant king; Then blooms each thing, then maids dance in a ring, Cold doth not sting, the pretty birds do singCuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo! The palm and may make country houses gay, The fields breathe sweet, the daisies kiss our feet, Spring, the sweet Spring! T. Nashe. |