Michael Drayton

My faire, had I not erst adorned my Lute
With those sweet strings stolne from thy golden hayre,
Vnto the world had all my ioyes been mute,
Nor had I learn'd to descant on my faire.
Had not mine eye seene thy Celestiall eye,
Nor my hart knowne the power of thy name,
My soule had ne'er felt thy Diuinitie,
Nor my Muse been the trumpet of thy fame.
But thy diuine perfections, by their skill,
This miracle on my poore Muse haue tried,
And, by inspiring, glorifide my quill,
And in my verse thy selfe art deified:
    Thus from thy selfe the cause is thus deriued,
    That by thy fame all fame shall be suruiued.

O thou vnkindest fayre! most fayrest shee,
In thine eyes tryumph murthering my poore hart,
Now doe I sweare by heauens, before we part,
My halfe-slaine hart shall take reuenge on thee.
Thy mother dyd her lyfe to death resigne,
And thou an Angell art, and from aboue;
Thy father was a man, that will I proue,
Yet thou a Goddesse art, and so diuine.
And thus, if thou be not of humaine kinde,
A Bastard on both sides needes must thou be;
Our Lawes allow no land to basterdy:
By natures Lawes we thee a bastard finde.
    Then hence to heauen, vnkind, for thy childs part:
    Goe bastard goe, for sure of thence thou art.

Rare of-spring of my thoughts, my dearest Loue,
Begot by fancy on sweet hope exhortiue,
In whom all purenes with perfection stroue,
Hurt in the Embryon makes my ioyes abhortiue.
And you, my sighes, Symtomas of my woe,
The dolefull Anthems of my endelesse care,
Lyke idle Ecchoes euer answering; so,
The mournfull accents of my loues dispayre.
And thou, Conceite, the shadow of my blisse,
Declyning with the setting of my sunne,
Springing with that, and fading straight with this,
Now hast thou end, and now thou wast begun:
    Now was thy pryme, and loe! is now thy waine;
    Now wast thou borne, now in thy cradle slayne.

Plac'd in the forlorne hope of all dispayre
Against the Forte where Beauties Army lies,
Assayld with death, yet armed with gastly feare,
Loe! thus my loue, my lyfe, my fortune tryes.
Wounded with Arrowes from thy lightning eyes,
My tongue in payne my harts counsels bewraying,
My rebell thought for me in Ambushe lyes,
To my lyues foe her Chieftaine still betraying.
Record my loue in Ocean waues (vnkind)
Cast my desarts into the open ayre,
Commit my words vnto the fleeting wind,
Cancell my name, and blot it with dispayre;
    So shall I bee as I had neuer beene,
    Nor my disgraces to the world be seene.

Why doe I speake of ioy, or write of loue,
When my hart is the very Den of horror,
And in my soule the paynes of hell I proue,
With all his torments and infernall terror?
Myne eyes want teares thus to bewayle my woe,
My brayne is dry with weeping all too long;
My sighes be spent with griefe and sighing so,
And I want words for to expresse my wrong.
But still, distracted in loues lunacy,
And Bedlam like thus rauing in my griefe,
Now rayle vpon her hayre, now on her eye,
Now call her Goddesse, then I call her thiefe;
    Now I deny her, then I doe confesse her,
    Now I doe curse her, then againe I blesse her.

My hart the Anuile where my thoughts doe beate,
My words the hammers fashioning my desire,
My breast the forge, including all the heate,
Loue is the fuell which maintaines the fire:
My sighes the bellowes which the flame increaseth,
Filling mine eares with noise and nightly groning,
Toyling with paine my labour neuer ceaseth,
In greeuous passions my woes styll bemoning.
Myne eyes with teares against the fire stryuing,
With scorching gleed my hart to cynders turneth;
But with those drops the coles againe reuyuing,
Still more and more vnto my torment burneth.
    With Sisiphus thus doe I role the stone,
    And turne the wheele with damned Ixion.

Blacke pytchy Night, companyon of my woe,
The Inne of care, the Nurse of drery sorrow,
Why lengthnest thou thy darkest howres so,
Still to prolong my long tyme lookt-for morrow?
Thou Sable shadow, Image of dispayre,
Portraite of hell, the ayres black mourning weed,
Recorder of reuenge, remembrancer of care,
The shadow and the vaile of euery sinfull deed.
Death like to thee, so lyue thou still in death,
The graue of ioy, prison of dayes delight.
Let heauens withdraw their sweet Ambrozian breath,
Nor Moone nor stars lend thee their shining light;
    For thou alone renew'st that olde desire,
    Which still torments me in dayes burning fire.

Sweete secrecie, what tongue can tell thy worth?
What mortall pen sufficiently can prayse thee?
What curious Pensill serues to lim thee forth?
What Muse hath power aboue thy height to raise thee?
Strong locke of kindnesse, Closet of loues store,
Harts Methridate, the soules preseruatiue;
O vertue! which all vertues doe adore,
Cheefe good, from whom all good things wee deriue.
O rare effect! true bond of friendships measure,
Conceite of Angels, which all wisdom teachest;
O, richest Casket of all heauenly treasure,
In secret silence which such wonders preachest.
    O purest mirror! wherein men may see
    The liuely Image of Diuinitie.

The golden Sunne vpon his fiery wheeles
The horned Ram doth in his course awake,
And of iust length our night and day doth make,
Flinging the Fishes backward with his heeles:
Then to the Tropicke takes his full Careere,
Trotting his sun-steeds till the Palfrays sweat,
Bayting the Lyon in his furious heat,
Till Virgins smyles doe sound his sweet reteere.
But my faire Planet, who directs me still,
Vnkindly such distemperature doth bring,
Makes Summer Winter, Autumne in the Spring,
Crossing sweet nature by vnruly will.
    Such is the sunne who guides my youthfull season,
    Whose thwarting course depriues the world of reason.

Who list to praise the dayes delicious lyght,
Let him compare it to her heauenly eye,
The sun-beames to the lustre of her sight;
So may the learned like the similie.
The mornings Crimson to her lyps alike,
The sweet of Eden to her breathes perfume,
The fayre Elizia to her fayrer cheeke,
Vnto her veynes the onely Phoenix plume.
The Angels tresses to her tressed hayre,
The Galixia to her more then white.
Praysing the fayrest, compare it to my faire,
Still naming her in naming all delight.
    So may he grace all these in her alone,
    Superlatiue in all comparison.

Define my loue, and tell the ioyes of heauen,
Expresse my woes, and shew the paynes of hell;
Declare what fate vnlucky starres haue giuen,
And aske a world vpon my life to dwell.
Make knowne that fayth vnkindnes could not moue;
Compare my worth with others base desert:
Let vertue be the tuch-stone of my loue,
So may the heauens reade wonders in my hart.
Behold the Clowdes which haue eclips'd my sunne,
And view the crosses which my course doth let;
Tell mee, if euer since the world begunne,
So faire a Morning had so foule a set?
    And, by all meanes, let black vnkindnes proue
    The patience of so rare, diuine a loue.

Since holy Vestall lawes haue been neglected,
The Gods pure fire hath been extinguisht quite;
No Virgin once attending on that light,
Nor yet those heauenly secrets once respected;
Till thou alone, to pay the heauens their dutie
Within the Temple of thy sacred name,
With thine eyes kindling that Celestiall flame,
By those reflecting Sun-beames of thy beautie.
Here Chastity that Vestall most diuine,
Attends that Lampe with eye which neuer sleepeth;
The volumes of Religions lawes shee keepeth,
Making thy breast that sacred reliques shryne,
    Where blessed Angels, singing day and night,
    Praise him which made that fire, which lends that light.

When I first ended, then I first began;
The more I trauell, further from my rest;
Where most I lost, there most of all I wan;
Pyned with hunger, rysing from a feast.
Mee thinks I flee, yet want I legs to goe,
Wise in conceite, in acte a very sot;
Rauisht with ioy amidst a hell of woe,
What most I seeme, that surest I am not.
I build my hopes a world aboue the skye,
Yet with a Mole I creepe into the earth:
In plenty am I staru'd with penury,
And yet I serfet in the greatest dearth.
    I haue, I want, dispayre, and yet desire,
    Burn'd in a Sea of Ice, and drown'd amidst a fire.

Goe you, my lynes, Embassadours of loue,
With my harts tribute to her conquering eyes,
From whence, if you one tear of pitty moue
For all my woes, that onely shall suffise.
When you Minerua in the sunne behold,
At her perfections stand you then and gaze,
Where in the compasse of a Marygold,
Meridianis sits within a maze.
And let Inuention of her beauty vaunt
When Dorus sings his sweet Pamelas loue,
And tell the Gods, Mars is predominant,
Seated with Sol, and weares Mineruas gloue:
    And tell the world, that in the world there is
    A heauen on earth, on earth no heauen but this.

In one whole world is but one Phoenix found,
A Phoenix thou, this Phoenix then alone:
By thy rare plume thy kind is easly knowne,
With heauenly colours dide, with natures wonder cround.
Heape thine own vertues, seasoned by their sunne,
On heauenly top of thy diuine desire;
Then with thy beautie set the same on fire,
So by thy death thy life shall be begunne.
Thy selfe, thus burned in this sacred flame,
With thine owne sweetnes al the heauens perfuming,
And stil increasing as thou art consuming,
Shalt spring againe from th' ashes of thy fame;
    And mounting vp shall to the heauens ascend:
    So maist thou liue, past world, past fame, past end.

Stay, stay, sweet Time; behold, or ere thou passe
From world to world, thou long hast sought to see,
That wonder now wherein all wonders be,
Where heauen beholds her in a mortall glasse.
Nay, looke thee, Time, in this Celesteall glasse,
And thy youth past in this faire mirror see:
Behold worlds Beautie in her infancie,
What shee was then, and thou, or ere shee was.
Now passe on, Time: to after-worlds tell this,
Tell truelie, Time, what in thy time hath beene,
That they may tel more worlds what Time hath seene,
And heauen may ioy to think on past worlds blisse.
    Heere make a Period, Time, and saie for mee,
    She was the like that neuer was, nor neuer more shalbe.

Vnto the World, to Learning, and to Heauen,
Three nines there are, to euerie one a nine;
One number of the earth, the other both diuine,
One wonder woman now makes three od numbers euen.
Nine orders, first, of Angels be in heauen;
Nine Muses doe with learning still frequent:
These with the Gods are euer resident.
Nine worthy men vnto the world were giuen.
My Worthie one to these nine Worthies addeth,
And my faire Muse one Muse vnto the nine;
And my good Angell, in my soule diuine,
With one more order these nine orders gladdeth.
    My Muse, my Worthy, and my Angell, then,
    Makes euery one of these three nines a ten.

Beauty sometime, in all her glory crowned,
Passing by that cleere fountain of thine eye,
Her sun-shine face there chaunsing to espy,
Forgot herselfe, and thought she had been drowned.
And thus, whilst Beautie on her beauty gazed,
Who then, yet liuing, deemd she had been dying,
And yet in death some hope of life espying,
At her owne rare perfections so amazed;
Twixt ioy and griefe, yet with a smyling frowning,
The glorious sun-beames of her eyes bright shining,
And shee, in her owne destiny diuining,
Threw in herselfe, to saue herselfe by drowning;
    The Well of Nectar, pau'd with pearle and gold,
    Where shee remaines for all eyes to behold.