I wonder, by my troth, what thou and I
Did, till we loved?  were we not weaned till then,
But ****** on country pleasures, childishly?
Or snorted we in the seven sleepers’ den?
’Twas so; but this, all pleasures fancies be.
If ever any beauty I did see,
Which I desired, and got, ’twas but a dream of thee.

And now good morrow to our waking souls,
Which watch not one another out of fear;
For love all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room an everywhere.
Let sea discovers to new worlds have gone,
Let maps to others, worlds on worlds have shown:
Let us possess one world; each hath one, and is one.
My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,
And true plain hearts do in the faces rest;
Where can we find two better hemishperes,
Without sharp North, without declining West?
Whatever dies was not mixed equally;
If our two loves be one, or thou and I
Love so alike that none do slacken, none can die.

I can love both fair and brown,
Her whom abundance melts, and her whom want betrays,
Her who loves loneness best, and her who masks and plays,
Her whom the country formed, and whom the town,
Her who believes, and her who tries,
Her who still weeps with spongy eyes,
And her who is dry cork, and never cries;
I can love her, and her, and you, and you,
I can love any, so she be not true.
Will no other vice content you?
Will it not serve your turn to do as did your mothers?
Or have you old vices spent, and now would find out others?
Or doth a fear, that men are true, torment you?
Oh we are not, be not you so;
Let me, and do you, twenty know.
Rob me, but bind me not, and let me go.
Must I, who came to travel thorough you,
Grow your fixed subject, because you are true?

Venus heard me sigh this song,
And by Love’s sweetest part, Variety, she swore
She heard not this till now; and that it should be so no more.
She went, examined, and returned ere long,
And said, “Alas, some two or three
Poor heretics in love there be,
Which think to ’stablish dangerous constancy.
But I have told them, Since you will be true,
You shall be true to them who’re false to you.”

When I died last, and, Dear, I die
     As often as from thee I go,
     Though it be but an hour ago,
And Lovers’ hours be full eternity,
I can remember yet, that I
     Something did say, and something did bestow;
Though I be dead, which sent me, I should be
Mine own executor and legacy.

I heard me say, “Tell her anon,
     That myself, that is you, not I,
     Did **** me,” and when I felt me die,
I bid me send my heart, when I was gone,
But alas could there find none,
     When I had ripp’d me, and search’d where hearts should lie;
It ****’d me again, that I who still was true,
In life, in my last will should cozen you.

Yet I found something like a heart,
     But colors it, and corners had,
     It was not good, it was not bad,
It was intire to none, and few had part.
As good as could be made by art
     It seem’d, and therefore for our losses sad,
I meant to send this heart in stead of mine,
But oh, no man could hold it, for ’twas thine.

Send home my long stray’d eyes to me,
Which O too long have dwelt on thee,
Yet since there they have learn’d such ill,
     Such forc’d fashions,
     And false passions,
          That they be
          Made by thee
Fit for no good sight, keep them still.

Send home my worthless heart again,
Which no unworthy thought could stain,
Which if’t be taught by thine
     To make jestings
     Of protestings,
          And cross both
          Word and oath,
Keep it, for then ’tis none of mine.

Yet send me back my heart and eyes,
That I may know, and see thy lies,
And may laugh and joy, when thou
     Art in anguish
     And dost languish
          For some one
          That will non,
Or prove as false as thou art now.

No Lover saith, I love, nor any other
Can judge a perfect Lover;
Hee thinkes that else none can, nor will agree
That any loves but hee;
I cannot say I’lov’d. for who can say
Hee was ****’d yesterday?
Lover withh excesse of heat, more yong than old,
Death kills with too much cold;
Wee dye but once, and who lov’d last did die,
Hee that saith twice, doth lye:
For though hee seeme to move, and stirre a while,
It doth the sense beguile.
Such life is like the light which bideth yet
When the lights life is set,
Or like the heat, which fire in solid matter
Leave behinde, two houres after.
Once I lov’s and dy’d; and am now become
Mine Epitaph and Tombe.
Here dead men speake their last, and so do I;
Love-slaine, loe, here I lye.

Upon this Primrose hill,
Where, if Heav’n would distil
A shower of rain, each several drop might go
To his own primrose, and grow manna so;
And where their form and their infinity
Make a terrestrial Galaxy,
As the small stars do in the sky:
I walk to find a true Love; and I see
That ’tis not a mere woman that is she,
But must or more or less than woman be.

Yet know I not which flower
I wish; a six, or four;
For should my true-Love less than woman be
She were scarce any thing; and then, should she
Be more than woman she would get above
All thought of ***, and think to move
My heart to study her, and not to love;
Both these were monsters; since there must reside
Falsehood in woman, I could more abide
She were by art than Nature falsified.

Live primrose then, and thrive
With thy true number five;
And woman, whom this flower doth represent,
With this mysterious number be content;
Ten is the farthest number; if half ten
Belong unto each woman, then
Each woman may take half us men;
Or if this will not serve their turn, since all
Numbers are odd or even, and they fall
First into this, five, woman may take us all.

Take heed of loving me;
At least remember I forbade it thee;
Not that I shall repair my unthrifty waste
Of breath and blood, upon thy sighs and tears,
By being to thee then what to me thou wast;
But so great joy our life at once outwears;
Then, lest thy love by my death frustrate be,
If thou love me, take heed of loving me.

Take heed of hating me,
Or too much triumph in the victory;
Not that I shall be mine own officer,
And hate with hate again retaliate;
But thou wilt lose the style of conqueror
If I, thy conquest, perish by thy hate;
Then, lest my being nothing lessen thee,
If thou hate me, take heed of hating me.

Yet, love and hate me too;
So, these extremes shall neither’s office do;
Love me, that I may die the gentler way;
Hate me, because thy love is too great for me;
Or let these two themselves, not me, decay;
So shall I live thy stage, not triumph be;
Lest thou thy love and hate and me undo,
To let me live, O love and hate me too.

When my grave is broke up again
    Some second guest to entertain,
    (For graves have learn'd that woman head,
    To be to more than one a bed)
        And he that digs it, spies
A bracelet of bright hair about the bone,
        Will he not let'us alone,
And think that there a loving couple lies,
Who thought that this device might be some way
To make their souls, at the last busy day,
Meet at this grave, and make a little stay?

    If this fall in a time, or land,
    Where mis-devotion doth command,
    Then he, that digs us up, will bring
    Us to the bishop, and the king,
        To make us relics; then
Thou shalt be a Mary Magdalen, and I
        A something else thereby;
All women shall adore us, and some men;
And since at such time miracles are sought,
I would have that age by this paper taught
What miracles we harmless lovers wrought.

    First, we lov'd well and faithfully,
    Yet knew not what we lov'd, nor why;
    Difference of *** no more we knew
    Than our guardian angels do;
        Coming and going, we
Perchance might kiss, but not between those meals;
        Our hands ne'er touch'd the seals
Which nature, injur'd by late law, sets free;
These miracles we did, but now alas,
All measure, and all language, I should pass,
Should I tell what a miracle she was.

Busy old fool, unruly sun,
Why dost thou thus,
Through windows and through curtains, call on us?
Must to thy motions lovers’ seasons run?
Saucy pedantic wretch, go chide
Late schoolboys and sour ‘prentices,
Go tell court-huntsmen that the King will ride,
Call country ants to harvest offices;
Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime,
Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.

Thy beams so reverend and strong
Why shouldst thou think?
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink
But that I would not lose her sight so long:
If her eyes have not blinded thine,
Look, and, tomorrow late, tell me
Whether both th’ Indias of spice and mine
Be where thou left’st them, or lie here with me.
Ask for those kings whom thou saw’st yesterday,
And thou shalt hear ‘All here in one bed lay’.

She is all states, and all princes I;
Nothing else is.
Princes do but play us; compared to this,
All honour’s mimic, all wealth alchemy.
Thou, sun, art half as happy as we,
In that the world’s contracted thus;
Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
To warm the world, that’s done in warming us.
Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere;
This bed thy centre is, these walls thy sphere.

Send me some token, that my hope may live,
  Or that my easeless thoughts may sleep and rest;
Send me some honey to make sweet my hive,
  That in my passions I may hope the best.
I beg no riband wrought with thine own hands,
  To knit our loves in the fantastic strain
Of new-touched youth; nor ring to show the stands
  Of our affection, that as that’s round and plain,
So should our loves meet in simplicity;
  No, nor the corals which thy wrist enfold,
Laced up together in congruity,
  To show our thoughts should rest in the same hold;
No, nor thy picture, though most gracious,
  And most desired, because best like the best;
Nor witty lines, which are most copious,
  Within the writings which thou hast addressed.

Send me nor this, nor that, to increase my store,
But swear thou think’st ‘I love thee,’ and no more.

I am two fools, I know—
For loving, and for saying so
In whining poetry;
But where’s that wiseman that would not be I,
If she would not deny?
Then, as th’ earths inward narrow crooked lanes
Do purge sea waters fretful salt away,
I thought, if I could draw my pains
Through rhymes vexation, I should them allay.
Grief brought to numbers cannot be so fierce,
For he tames it that fetters it in verse.

But when I have done so,
Some man, his art and voice to show,
Doth set and sing my pain,
And, by delighting many, frees again
Grief, which verse did restrain.
To Love and Grief tribute of verse belongs,
But not of such as pleases when ’tis read;
Both are increased by such songs,
For both their triumphs so are published;
And I, which was two fooles, do so grow three;
Who are a little wise, the best fools be.

Come, Madam, come, all rest my powers defy,
          Until I labour, I in labour lie.
     The foe oft-times having the foe in sight,
  Is tired with standing though they never fight.
Off with that girdle, like heaven's zone glistering,
        But a far fairer world encompassing.
  Unpin that spangled breastplate which you wear,
That th' eyes of busy fools may be stopped there.
     Unlace yourself, for that harmonious chime
  Tells me from you, that now 'tis your bed time.
      Off with that happy busk, which I envy,
  That still can be, and still can stand so nigh.
Your gown going off, such beauteous state reveals,
As when from flowery meads th' hill's shadow steals.
        Off with that wiry coronet and show
      The hairy diadem which on you doth grow;
  Now off with those shoes, and then safely tread
   In this love's hallowed temple, this soft bed.
   In such white robes heaven's angels used to be
   Received by men; thou angel bring'st with thee
    A heaven like Mahomet's paradise; and though
     Ill spirits walk in white, we easily know
     By this these angels from an evil sprite,
Those set our hairs, but these our flesh upright.
      License my roving hands, and let them go
       Before, behind, between, above, below.
          O my America, my new found land,
  My kingdom, safeliest when with one man manned,
       My mine of precious stones, my empery,
     How blessed am I in this discovering thee!
      To enter in these bonds, is to be free;
    Then where my hand is set, my seal shall be.
      Full nakedness, all joys are due to thee
    As souls unbodied, bodies unclothed must be,
   To taste whole joys. Gems which you women use
   Are like Atlanta's *****, cast in men's views,
     That when a fool's eye lighteth on a gem,
    His earthly soul may covet theirs, not them.
  Like pictures, or like books' gay coverings made
      For laymen, are all women thus arrayed;
     Themselves are mystic books, which only we
       Whom their imputed grace will dignify
     Must see revealed. Then since I may know,
        As liberally, as to a midwife, show
  Thyself: cast all, yea, this white linen hence,
      Here is no penance, much less innocence.
     To teach thee, I am naked first, why then
  What needst thou have more covering than a man.

I fix mine eye on thine, and there
Pity my picture burning in thine eye;
My picture drowned in a transparent tear,
When I look lower I espy.
Hadst thou the wicked skill
By pictures made and mard, to ****,
How many ways mightst thou perform thy will?

But now I have drunk thy sweet salt tears,
And though thou pour more I’ll depart;
My picture vanished, vanish fears
That I can be endamaged by that art;
Though thou retain of me
One picture more, yet that will be,
Being in thine own heart, from all malice free.

Now thou hast loved me one whole day,
Tomorrow when thou leav’st, what wilt thou say?
Wilt thou then antedate some new made vow?
      Or say that now
We are not just those persons, which we were?
Or, that oaths made in reverential fear
Of Love, and his wrath, any may forswear?
Or, as true deaths, true marriages untie,
So lovers’ contracts, images of those,
Bind but till sleep, death’s image, them unloose?
      Or, your own end to justify,
For having purposed change, and falsehood, you
Can have no way but falsehood to be true?
Vain lunatic, against these ’scapes I could
      Dispute, and conquer, if I would,
      Which I abstain to do,
For by tomorrow, I may think so too.