Cease, then, in vain
To blot my name50
With forg’d apostasy!
Thine is that stain
Who dar’st to claim
What others ask of thee.
Of lovers they are only true55
Who pay their hearts where hearts[33:2] are due.
To Chariessa,
Beholding herself in a Glass.[34:1]
Cast, Chariessa, cast that glass away;
Not in its crystal face thine own survey.
What can be free from Love’s imperious laws,
When painted shadows real flames can cause?
The fires may burn thee from this mirror rise,5
By the reflected beams of thine own eyes;
And thus at last fall’n with thyself in love,
Thou wilt my rival, thine own[34:2] martyr, prove.
But if thou dost desire thy form to view,
Look in my heart, where Love thy picture drew,10
And then, if pleas’d with thine own shape thou be,
Learn how to love thyself by[34:3] loving me.
When I lie burning in thine eye,
Or freezing in thy breast,
What martyrs, in wish’d flames that die,
Are half so pleas’d or blest?
When thy soft accents through mine ear5
Into my soul do fly,
What angel would not quit his sphere,
To hear such harmony?
Or when the kiss thou gav’st me last
My soul stole in its breath,10
What life would sooner be embrac’d
Than so desir’d a death?