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That in thy face sweet love should ever dwell; |
Whate'er thy thoughts or thy heart's workings be, |
Thy looks should nothing thence but sweetness tell. |
How like Eve's apple doth thy beauty grow, |
if thy sweet virtue answer not thy show! |
They that have power to hurt and will do none, |
That do not do the thing they most do show, |
Who, moving others, are themselves as stone, |
Unmoved, 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. |
How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame |
Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose, |
Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name! |
O, in what sweets dost thou thy sins enclose! |
That tongue that tells the story of thy days, |
Making lascivious comments on thy sport, |
Cannot dispraise but in a kind of praise; |
Naming thy name blesses an ill report. |
O, what a mansion have those vices got |
Which for their habitation chose out thee, |
Where beauty's veil doth cover every blot, |
And all things turn to fair that eyes can see! |
Take heed, dear heart, of this large privilege; |
The hardest knife ill-used doth lose his edge. |
Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness; |
Some say thy grace is youth and gentle sport; |
Both grace and faults are loved of more and less; |
Thou makest faults graces that to thee resort. |
As on the finger of a throned queen |
The basest jewel will be well esteem'd, |
So are those errors that in thee are seen |
To truths translated and for true things deem'd. |
How many lambs might the stern wolf betray, |
If like a lamb he could his looks translate! |
How many gazers mightst thou lead away, |
If thou wouldst use the strength of all thy state! |
But do not so; I love thee in such sort |
As, thou being mine, mine is thy good report. |
How like a winter hath my absence been |
From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year! |
What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen! |
What old December's bareness every where! |
And yet this time removed was summer's time, |
The teeming autumn, big with rich increase, |
Bearing the wanton burden of the prime, |
Like widow'd wombs after their lords' decease: |
Yet this abundant issue seem'd to me |
But hope of orphans and unfather'd fruit; |
For summer and his pleasures wait on thee, |
And, thou away, the very birds are mute; |
Or, if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer |
That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near. |
From you have I been absent in the spring, |
When proud-pied April dress'd in all his trim |
Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing, |
That heavy Saturn laugh'd and leap'd with him. |
Yet nor the lays of birds nor the sweet smell |
Of different flowers in odour and in hue |
Could make me any summer's story tell, |
Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew; |
Nor did I wonder at the lily's white, |
Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose; |
They were but sweet, but figures of delight, |
Drawn after you, you pattern of all those. |
Yet seem'd it winter still, and, you away, |
As with your shadow I with these did play: |
The forward violet thus did I chide: |
Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells, |
If not from my love's breath? The purple pride |
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells |
In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed. |
The lily I condemned for thy hand, |
And buds of marjoram had stol'n thy hair: |
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand, |
One blushing shame, another white despair; |
A third, nor red nor white, had stol'n of both |
And to his robbery had annex'd thy breath; |
But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth |
A vengeful canker eat him up to death. |
More flowers I noted, yet I none could see |
But sweet or colour it had stol'n from thee. |
Where art thou, Muse, that thou forget'st so long |
To speak of that which gives thee all thy might? |
Spend'st thou thy fury on some worthless song, |
Darkening thy power to lend base subjects light? |
Return, forgetful Muse, and straight redeem |
In gentle numbers time so idly spent; |
Sing to the ear that doth thy lays esteem |
And gives thy pen both skill and argument. |
Rise, resty Muse, my love's sweet face survey, |
If Time have any wrinkle graven there; |
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