| |
| THE DEW no more will weep | |
| The primrose’s pale cheek to deck: | |
| The dew no more will sleep | |
| Nuzzled in the lily’s neck: | |
| Much rather would it tremble here | 5 |
| And leave them both to be thy tear. | |
| |
| Not the soft gold which | |
| Steals from the amber-weeping tree, | |
| Makes Sorrow half so rich | |
| As the drops distill’d from thee: | 10 |
| Sorrow’s best jewels lie in these | |
| Caskets of which Heaven keeps the keys. | |
| |
| When Sorrow would be seen | |
| In her brightest majesty, | |
| —For she is a Queen— | 15 |
| Then is she drest by none but thee: | |
| Then, and only then, she wears | |
| Her richest pearls—I mean thy tears. | |
| |
| Not in the evening’s eyes, | |
| When they red with weeping are | 20 |
| For the sun that dies, | |
| Sits Sorrow with a face so fair: | |
| Nowhere but here did ever meet | |
| Sweetness so sad, sadness so sweet. | |
| |
| When some new bright guest | 25 |
| Takes up among the stars a room, | |
| And Heaven will make a feast, | |
| Angels with their bottles come, | |
| And draw from these full eyes of thine | |
| Their Master’s water, their own wine. | 30 |
| |
| Does the night arise? | |
| Still thy tears do fall and fall. | |
| Does night lose her eyes? | |
| Still the fountain weeps for all. | |
| Let night or day do what they will, | 35 |
| Thou hast thy task, thou weepest still. | |
| |
