| |
| SEE’ST 1 not, my love, with what a grace | |
| The Spring resembles thy sweet face? | |
| Here let us sit, and in these bowers | |
| Receive the odours of the flowers, | |
| For Flora, by thy beauty woo’d, conspires thy good. | 5 |
| |
| See how she sends her fragrant sweet, | |
| And doth this homage to thy feet, | |
| Bending so low her stooping head | |
| To kiss the ground where thou dost tread, | |
| And all her flowers proudly meet, to kiss thy feet. | 10 |
| |
| Then let us walk, my dearest love, | |
| And on this carpet strictly prove | |
| Each other’s vow; from thy request | |
| No other love invades my breast. | |
| For how can I contemn that fire which Gods admire? | 15 |
| |
| To crop that rose why dost thou seek, | |
| When there’s a purer in thy cheek? | |
| Like coral held in thy fair hands, | |
| Or blood and milk that mingled stands: | |
| To whom the Powers and grace have given, a type of Heaven. | 20 |
| |
| Yon lily stooping t’wards this place, | |
| Is a pale shadow for thy face, | |
| Under which veil doth seem to rush | |
| Modest Endymion’s ruddy blush. | |
| A blush, indeed, more pure and fair than lilies are. | 25 |
| |
| Glance on those flowers thy radiant eyes, | |
| Through which clear beams they’ll sympathise | |
| Reflective love, to make them far | |
| More glorious than th’ Hesperian star, | |
| For every swain amazèd lies, and gazing dies. | 30 |
| |
| See how these silly flowers twine, | |
| With sweet embracings, and combine, | |
| Striving with curious looms to set | |
| Their pale and red into a net, | |
| To show how pure desire doth rest for ever blest. | 35 |
| |
| Why wilt thou then unconstant be? | |
| T’ infringe the laws of amity, | |
| And so much disrespect my heart | |
| To derogate from what thou art? | |
| When in harmonious love there is Elysian bliss. | 40 |
