XIX. In Cupid’s bow, how are my heart-strings bent!

Sir Philip Sidney (1554–1586)

IN CUPID’s bow, how are my heart-strings bent!

That see my wrack, and yet embrace the same.

When most I glory, then I feel most shame.

I willing run; yet while I run, repent.

My best wits still their own disgrace invent.

My very ink turns straight to STELLA’s name;

And yet my words—as them, my pen doth frame—

Advise themselves that they are vainly spent.

For though she pass all things, yet what is all

That unto me; who fares like him that both

Looks to the skies and in a ditch doth fall?

O let me prop my mind, yet in his growth,

And not in nature for best fruits unfit!

“Scholar!” saith LOVE, “bend hitherward your wit!”