Sonnet III. The heavens beheld the beauty of my Queen

Giles Fletcher (1586?–1623)

THE HEAVENS beheld the beauty of my Queen;

And all amazed, to wonder thus began:

“Why dotes not JOVE, as erst we all have seen,

And shapes himself like to a seemly man?

Mean are the matches which he sought before;

Like bloomless buds, too base to make compare:

And she alone hath treasured Beauty’s store;

In whom all gifts and princely graces are.”

CUPID replied, “I posted with the sun

To view the Maids that lived in all those days:

And none there was that might not well be won,

But She; most hard, most cold, made of delays.”

Heavens were deceived, and wrong they do esteem;

She hath no heat, although She living seem.