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 lours;
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 decayèd is.
XXXVI
O let my heart, my body, and my tongue
Bleed forth the lively streams of faith unfeigned,
Worship my saint the gods and saints among,
Praise and extol her fair that me hath pained!
O let the smoke of my suppressed desire,
Raked up in ashes of my burning breast,
Break out at length and to the clouds aspire,
Urging the heavens to afford me rest;
But let my body naturally descend
Into the bowels of our common mother,
And to the very centre let it wend,
When it no lower can, her griefs to smother!
And yet when I so low do buried lie,
Then shall my love ascend unto the sky.
XXXVII
Fair is my love that feeds among the lilies,
The lilies growing in that pleasant garden
Where Cupid's mount, that well beloved 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.
XXXVIII
Was never eye did see my mistress' face,
Was never ear did hear Fidessa's tongue,
Was never mind that once did mind her grace,
That ever thought the travail to be long.
When her I see, no creature I behold,
So plainly say these advocates of love,
That now do fear and now to speak are bold,
Trembling apace when they resolve to prove.
These strange effects do show a hidden power,
A majesty all base attempts reproving,
That glads or daunts as she doth laugh or lower;
Surely some goddess harbours in their moving
Who thus my Muse from base attempts hath raised,
Whom thus my Muse beyond compare hath praised.
XXXIX
My lady's hair is threads of beaten gold,
Her front the purest crystal eye hath seen,
Her eyes the brightest stars the heavens hold,
Her cheeks red roses such as seld have been;
Her pretty lips of red vermillion die,
Her hand of ivory the purest white,
Her blush Aurora or the morning sky,
Her breast displays two silver fountains bright
The spheres her voice, her grace the Graces three:
Her body is the saint that I adore;
Her smiles and favours sweet as honey be;
Her feet fair Thetis praiseth evermore.
But ah, the worst and last is yet behind,
For of a griffon she doth bear the mind!
XL