THE BROKEN HEART

He is stark mad, whoever says,

That he hath been in love an hour,

Yet not that love so soon decays,

But that it can ten in less space devour; Who will believe me, if I swear

That I have had the plague a year?

Who would not laugh at me, if I should

I saw a flash of powder burn a day?

Ah, what a trifle is a heart,

If once into Love's hands it come!

All other griefs allow a part

say

To other griefs, and ask themselves but some; They come to us, but us Love draws;

He swallows us and never chaws;

By him, as by chain'd shot, whole ranks do die;
He is the tyrant pike, our hearts the fry.

If't were not so, what did become

Of my heart when I first saw thee?

I brought a heart into the room,

But from the room I carried none with me.

If it had gone to thee, I know

Mine would have taught thy heart to show
More pity unto me; but Love, alas!
At one first blow did shiver it as glass.

Yet nothing can to nothing fall,

Nor any place be empty quite;

Therefore I think my breast hath all

Those pieces still, though they be not unite; And now, as broken glasses show

A hundred lesser faces, so

My rags of heart can like, wish, and adore,
But after one such love, can love no more.

THE PARADOX

No lover saith, I love; nor any other

Can judge a perfect lover;

He thinks that else none can, nor will agree, any loves but he.

That

I cannot say I loved, for who can say

He was kill'd yesterday.

Love with excess of heat, more young than old, Death kills with too much cold.

We die but once, and who loved last did die; He that saith twice, doth lie;

For though he seem to move, and stir a while, It doth the sense beguile.

Such life is like the light which bideth yet
When the light's life is set;

Or like the heat which fire in solid matter
Leaves behind, two hours after.

Once I loved and died; and am now become Mine epitaph and tomb;

Here dead men speak their last, and so do I;

Love-slain, lo! here I die.

NEGATIVE LOVE

I NEVER stoop'd so low, as they
Which on an eye, cheek, lip, can prey;
Seldom to them which soar no higher
Than virtue, or the mind to admire.
For sense and understanding may

Know what gives fuel to their fire;
My love, though silly, is more brave;
I miss whene'er I crave,

For

may

If I know yet what I would have.

If that be simply perfectest,
Which can by no way be express'd
But negatives, my love is so.

To all which all love, I say no.

If any who deciphers best,

What we know not · ourselves.

Let him teach me that nothing. This
As yet my ease and comfort is,

Though I speed not, I cannot miss.

can know,

THE ECSTACY

WHERE, like a pillow on a bed,

A pregnant bank swell'd up, to rest The violet's reclining head,

Sat we two, one another's best.

Our hands were firmly cèmented

By a fast balm, which thence did spring; Our eye-beams twisted, and did thread Our eyes upon one double string.

So to engraft our hands, as yet

Was all our means to make us one;

And pictures in our eyes to get
Was all our propagation.

As, 'twixt two equal armies, Fate

Suspends uncertain victory,

Our souls-which to advance their state

Were gone out hung 'twixt her and me.

And whilst our souls negotiate there,

We like sepulchral statues lay;