XXVIII
How can I then return in happy plight,
That am debarreʼd the benefit of rest?
When dayʼs oppression is not easʼd by night,
But day by night and night by day oppressʼd,
And each, though enemies to eitherʼs reign,
Do in consent shake hands to torture me,
The one by toil, the other to complain
How far I toil, still farther off from thee.
I tell the day, to please him thou art bright,
And dost him grace when clouds do blot the heaven:
So flatter I the swart-complexionʼd night,
When sparkling stars twire not thou gildʼst the even.
But day doth daily draw my sorrows longer,
And night doth nightly make griefʼs length seem stronger.
XXIX
When in disgrace with fortune and menʼs eyes
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featurʼd like him, like him with friends possessʼd,
Desiring this manʼs art, and that manʼs scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts my self almost despising,
Haply I think on thee,—and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heavenʼs gate;
For thy sweet love rememberʼd such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
XXX
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 timeʼs waste:
Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow,
For precious friends hid in deathʼs dateless night,
And weep afresh loveʼs long since cancellʼd woe,
And moan the expense of many a vanishʼd sight:
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell oʼer
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,
Which I new pay as if not paid before.
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,
All losses are restorʼd and sorrows end.
XXXI
Thy bosom is endeared with all hearts,
Which I by lacking have supposed dead;
And there reigns Love, and all Loveʼs loving parts,
And all those friends which I thought buried.
How many a holy and obsequious tear
Hath dear religious love stolʼn from mine eye,
As interest of the dead, which now appear
But things removʼd that hidden in thee lie!
Thou art the grave where buried love doth live,
Hung with the trophies of my lovers gone,
Who all their parts of me to thee did give,
That due of many now is thine alone:
Their images I lovʼd, I view in thee,
And thou—all they—hast all the all of me.
XXXII
If thou survive my well-contented day,
When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover
And shalt by fortune once more re-survey
These poor rude lines of thy deceased lover,
Compare them with the bettʼring of the time,
And though they be outstrippʼd by every pen,
Reserve them for my love, not for their rhyme,
Exceeded by the height of happier men.
O! then vouchsafe me but this loving thought:
‘Had my friendʼs Muse grown with this growing age,
A dearer birth than this his love had brought,
To march in ranks of better equipage:
But since he died and poets better prove,
Theirs for their style Iʼll read, his for his love’.
XXXIII
Full many a glorious morning have I seen
Flatter the mountain tops with sovereign eye,
Kissing with golden face the meadows green,
Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy;
Anon permit the basest clouds to ride
With ugly rack on his celestial face,
And from the forlorn world his visage hide,
Stealing unseen to west with this disgrace:
Even so my sun one early morn did shine,
With all triumphant splendour on my brow;
But out! alack! he was but one hour mine,
The region cloud hath maskʼd him from me now.
Yet him for this my love no whit disdaineth;
Suns of the world may stain when heavenʼs sun staineth.
XXXIV
Why didst thou promise such a beauteous day,
And make me travel forth without my cloak,
To let base clouds oʼertake me in my way,
Hiding thy bravery in their rotten smoke?
ʼTis not enough that through the cloud thou break,
To dry the rain on my storm-beaten face,
For no man well of such a salve can speak,
That heals the wound, and cures not the disgrace:
Nor can thy shame give physic to my grief;
Though thou repent, yet I have still the loss:
The offenderʼs sorrow lends but weak relief
To him that bears the strong offenceʼs cross.
Ah! but those tears are pearl which thy love sheds,
And they are rich and ransom all ill deeds.
XXXV
No more be grievʼd at that which thou hast done:
Roses have thorns, and silver fountains mud:
Clouds and eclipses stain both moon and sun,
And loathsome canker lives in sweetest bud.
All men make faults, and even I in this,
Authorizing thy trespass with compare,
Myself corrupting, salving thy amiss,
Excusing thy sins more than thy sins are;
For to thy sensual fault I bring in sense,—
Thy adverse party is thy advocate,—
And ʼgainst myself a lawful plea commence:
Such civil war is in my love and hate,
That I an accessary needs must be,
To that sweet thief which sourly robs from me.
XXXVI
Let me confess that we two must be twain,
Although our undivided loves are one:
So shall those blots that do with me remain,
Without thy help, by me be borne alone.
In our two loves there is but one respect,
Though in our lives a separable spite,
Which though it alter not loveʼs sole effect,
Yet doth it steal sweet hours from loveʼs delight.
I may not evermore acknowledge thee,
Lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame,
Nor thou with public kindness honour me,
Unless thou take that honour from thy name:
But do not so, I love thee in such sort,
As thou being mine, mine is thy good report.