Yet should the thoughts of me your humble swain
Ascend to heaven, in honour of my Love.

Were I as high as heaven above the plain,
And you, my Love, as humble and as low
As are the deepest bottoms of the main,
Whereso'er you were, with you my love should go.

Were you the earth, dear Love, and I the skies,
My love should shine on you like to the sun,
And look upon you with ten thousand eyes
Till heaven wax'd blind, and till the world were done.

Whereso'er I am, below, or else above you,
Whereso'er you are, my heart shall truly love you.

XXVI

7. Sylvester

CARPE DIEM

MISTRESS mine, where are you roaming?

O stay and hear! your true-love 's coming
That can sing both high and low;

Trip no further, pretty sweeting,
Journeys end in lovers' meeting -

Every wise man's son doth know.

What is love? 't is not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure:

In delay there lies no plenty,

Then come kiss me, Sweet-and-twenty,

Youth's a stuff will not endure.

W. Shakespeare

W

XXVII

WINTER

HEN icicles hang by the wall

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail,
And Tom bears logs into the hall,

And milk comes frozen home in pail;
When blood is nipt, and ways be foul,
Then nightly sings the staring owl

Tuwhoo!

Tuwhit! tuwhoo! A merry note! greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

While

When all around the wind doth blow,
And coughing drowns the parson's saw,
And birds sit brooding in the snow,
And Marian's nose looks red and raw ;
When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl -
Then nightly sings the staring owl

Tuwhoo!

Tuwhit! tuwhoo! A merry note !

While

greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

W. Shakespeare

XXVIII

HAT time of year thou may'st in me behold

ΤΗ

When yellow leaves, or none, or few do hang Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.

In me thou seest the twilight of such day

As after sunset fadeth in the west,

Which by and by black night doth take away,
Death's second self, that seals up all in rest.

In me thou seest the glowing of such fire,
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie

As the deathbed whereon it must expire,

Consumed with that which it was nourish'd by:

This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong,

To love that well which thou must leave erelong.

W. Shakespeare

WHE

XXIX

REMEMBRANCE

WHEN to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,

I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,

And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste;

Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow,
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,
And weep afresh love's long-since-cancell'd woe,
And moan the expense of many a vanish'd sight.

Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
The sad account of fore-bemoanéd moan,
Which I new pay as if not paid before :

But if the while I think on thee, dear friend, All losses are restored, and sorrows end.

W. Shakespeare

своя

L

XXX

REVOLUTIONS

IKE as the waves make towards the pebbled shore

So do our minutes hasten to their end;

Each changing place with that which goes before,

In sequent toil all forwards do contend.

Nativity once in the main of light

Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown'd,
Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight,

And Time that gave, doth now his gift confound.

Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth,
And delves the parallels in beauty's brow;
Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth,

And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow.

And yet, to times in hope, my verse shall stand
Praising Thy worth, despite his cruel hand.
W. Shakespeare

XXXI

F

AREWELL! thou art too dear for my possessing,

And like enough thou know'st thy estimate:

The charter of thy worth gives thee releasing,
My bonds in thee are all determinate.

For how do I hold thee but by thy granting?
And for that riches where is my deserving?
The cause of this fair gift in me is wanting,
And so my patent back again is swerving.

Thyself thou gav'st, thy own worth then not knowing,
Or me, to whom thou gav'st it, else mistaking;
So thy great gift, upon misprision growing,
Comes home again, on better judgment making.

Thus have I had thee as a dream doth flatter;
In sleep, a king; but waking, no such matter.
W. Shakespeare

XXXII

THE LIFE WITHOUT PASSION

HEY that have power to hurt, and will do none,

most

Who, moving others, are themselves as stone,
Unmovéd, cold, and to temptation slow,

They rightly do inherit Heaven's graces,
And husband nature's riches from expense;
They are the lords and owners of their faces,
Others, but stewards of their excellence.

The summer's flower is to the summer sweet,
Though to itself it only live and die ;
But if that flower with base infection meet,
The basest weed outbraves his dignity :

For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds;
Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds.

W. Shakespeare