The Sonnets and Other Poems
Page 6
The path is smooth that leadeth on to danger:
I hate not love, but your device789 in love
That lends embracements unto every stranger —
You do it for increase? O strange excuse,
When reason is the bawd792 to lust’s abuse!
‘Call it not love, for love to heaven is fled,
Since sweating lust on earth usurped his name,
Under whose simple semblance795 he hath fed
Upon fresh beauty, blotting796 it with blame,
Which797 the hot tyrant stains and soon bereaves,
As caterpillars do the tender leaves.
‘Love comforteth like sunshine after rain,
But lust’s effect is tempest after sun:
Love’s gentle spring doth always fresh remain,
Lust’s winter comes ere summer half be done:
Love surfeits not, lust like a glutton dies:
Love is all truth, lust full of forgèd lies.
‘More I could tell, but more I dare not say:
The text806 is old, the orator too green.
Therefore in sadness now I will away.
My face is full of shame, my heart of teen808,
Mine ears, that to your wanton talk attended,
Do burn themselves for having so offended.’
With this, he breaketh from the sweet embrace
Of those fair arms which bound him to her breast
And homeward through the dark laund813 runs apace,
Leaves love upon her back deeply distressed.
Look how a bright star shooteth from the sky,
So glides he in the night from Venus’ eye816,
Which after him she darts, as one on shore
Gazing upon a late-embarkèd818 friend
Till the wild waves will have him seen no more,
Whose ridges820 with the meeting clouds contend;
So did the merciless and pitchy821 night
Fold in822 the object that did feed her sight.
Whereat amazed, as one that unaware
Hath dropped a precious jewel in the flood824,
Or stonished825 as night-wand’rers often are,
Their light blown out in some mistrustful wood,
Even so confounded827 in the dark she lay,
Having lost the fair discovery of her way828.
And now she beats her heart, whereat it groans,
That all the neighbour830 caves, as seeming troubled,
Make verbal repetition of831 her moans:
Passion832 on passion deeply is redoubled,
‘Ay me!’ she cries and twenty times, ‘Woe, woe!’
And twenty echoes twenty times cry so.
She, marking them, begins a wailing note
And sings extemporally836 a woeful ditty:
How love makes young men thrall837 and old men dote,
How love is wise in folly, foolish-witty.
Her heavy839 anthem still concludes in woe,
And still the choir of echoes answer so.
Her song was tedious and outwore the night,
For lovers’ hours are long, though seeming short:
If pleased themselves, others, they think, delight
In suchlike circumstance, with suchlike sport:
Their copious845 stories, oftentimes begun,
End without audience and are never done.
For who hath she to spend the night withal847
But idle sounds resembling parasites848,
Like shrill-tongued tapsters849 answering every call,
Soothing the humour850 of fantastic wits?
She says ‘ ’Tis so’. They answer all ‘ ’Tis so’,
And would say after her, if she said ‘No’.
Lo, here the gentle lark, weary of rest,
From his moist cabinet854 mounts up on high
And wakes the morning, from whose silver breast
The sun ariseth in his majesty,
Who doth the world so gloriously behold
That cedar tops and hills seem burnished gold.
Venus salutes him with this fair good-morrow,
‘O thou clear860 god and patron of all light,
From whom each lamp and shining star doth borrow
The beauteous influence862 that makes him bright,
There lives a son863 that sucked an earthly mother
May864 lend thee light, as thou dost lend to other.’
This said, she hasteth to a myrtle865 grove,
Musing the morning is so much o’erworn866,
And yet she hears no tidings of her love.
She hearkens868 for his hounds and for his horn:
Anon she hears them chant it lustily,
And all in haste she coasteth870 to the cry.
And as she runs, the bushes in the way
Some catch her by the neck, some kiss her face,
Some twined about her thigh to make her stay.
She wildly breaketh from their strict embrace
Like a milch doe875, whose swelling dugs do ache,
Hasting to feed her fawn hid in some brake876.
By this she hears the hounds are at a bay877,
Whereat she starts, like one that spies an adder
Wreathed up in fatal folds879 just in his way,
The fear whereof doth make him shake and shudder:
Even so the timorous yelping of the hounds
Appals882 her senses and her spirit confounds.
For now she knows it is no gentle chase883,
But the blunt boar, rough bear, or lion proud,
Because the cry remaineth in one place,
Where fearfully the dogs exclaim aloud:
Finding their enemy to be so curst887,
They all strain court’sy888 who shall cope him first.
This dismal889 cry rings sadly in her ear,
Through which it enters to surprise890 her heart,
Who, overcome by doubt and bloodless fear,
With cold-pale weakness numbs each feeling part:
Like soldiers, when their captain once doth yield,
They basely fly894 and dare not stay the field.
Thus stands she in a trembling ecstasy895,
Till, cheering up her senses all dismayed,
She tells them ’tis a causeless fantasy
And childish error that they are afraid,
Bids899 them leave quaking, bids them fear no more —
And with that word she spied the hunted boar,
Whose frothy901 mouth, bepainted all with red,
Like milk and blood being mingled both together,
A second fear through all her sinews903 spread,
Which madly hurries her she knows not whither.
This way runs and now she will no further,
But back retires to rate906 the boar for murther.
A thousand spleens907 bear her a thousand ways,
She treads the path that she untreads again.
Her more than haste is mated909 with delays,
Like the proceedings of a drunken brain,
Full of respects911, yet naught at all respecting,
In hand912 with all things, naught at all effecting.
Here kennelled in a brake she finds a hound
And asks the weary caitiff914 for his master,
And there another licking of his wound,
Gainst venomed sores the only sovereign plaster916.
And here she meets another, sadly scowling,
To whom she speaks and he replies with howling.
When he hath ceased his ill-resounding919 noise,
Another flap-mouthed920 mourner, black and grim,
Against the welkin921 volleys out his voice.
Another and another answer him,
Clapping923 their proud tails to the ground below,
Shaking their scratched ears, bleeding as they go.
Look, how the world’s poor people are amazed
At apparitions, signs and
prodigies926,
Whereon with fearful eyes they long have gazed,
Infusing928 them with dreadful prophecies:
So she at these sad signs draws up929 her breath
And, sighing it again, exclaims on930 death.
‘Hard-favoured931 tyrant, ugly, meagre, lean,
Hateful divorce932 of love’ — thus chides she Death —
‘Grim-grinning ghost, earth’s worm933, what dost thou mean
To stifle beauty and to steal his breath,
Who when he lived, his breath and beauty set
Gloss on the rose, smell to the violet?
‘If he be dead — O no, it cannot be,
Seeing his beauty, thou shouldst strike at it!
O yes, it may! Thou hast no eyes939 to see,
But hatefully at random dost thou hit:
Thy mark941 is feeble age, but thy false dart
Mistakes that aim and cleaves942 an infant’s heart.
‘Hadst thou but bid beware, then he had943 spoke,
And, hearing him, thy power had lost his power —
The destinies will curse thee for this stroke —
They bid thee crop a weed, thou pluck’st a flower:
Love’s golden arrow947 at him should have fled,
And not death’s ebon948 dart to strike him dead.
‘Dost thou drink tears, that thou provok’st such weeping?
What may a heavy950 groan advantage thee?
Why hast thou cast into eternal sleeping
Those eyes that taught all other eyes to see?
Now nature cares not for thy mortal vigour953,
Since her best work is ruined with thy rigour954.’
Here overcome as one full of despair,
She vailed956 her eyelids who like sluices stopped
The crystal tide957 that from her two cheeks fair
In the sweet channel of her bosom dropped,
But through the floodgates breaks the silver rain
And with his strong course960 opens them again.
O, how her eyes and tears did lend and borrow961:
Her eye seen in the tears, tears in her eye,
Both crystals963, where they viewed each other’s sorrow,
Sorrow that friendly sighs sought still to dry,
But like a stormy day, now wind, now rain,
Sighs dry her cheeks, tears make them wet again.
Variable967 passions throng her constant woe
As striving who should best become968 her grief:
All entertained969, each passion labours so
That every present sorrow seemeth chief,
But none is best. Then join they all together
Like many clouds consulting for972 foul weather.
By this973, far off she hears some huntsman hollo.
A nurse’s song ne’er pleased her babe so well:
The dire imagination975 she did follow
This sound of hope doth labour to expel,
For now reviving joy bids her rejoice
And flatters her it is Adonis’ voice.
Whereat her tears began to turn their tide,
Being prisoned in her eye like pearls in glass,
Yet sometimes falls an orient981 drop beside,
Which her cheek melts, as scorning it should pass
To wash the foul983 face of the sluttish ground,
Who is but drunken when she seemeth drowned.
O hard-believing985 love, how strange it seems
Not to believe and yet too credulous!
Thy weal987 and woe are both of them extremes,
Despair and hope makes thee ridiculous:
The one doth flatter thee in thoughts unlikely,
In likely thoughts the other kills thee quickly.
Now she unweaves the web that she hath wrought991:
Adonis lives and Death is not to blame.
It was not she that called him all to naught993,
Now she adds honours to his hateful name:
She clepes995 him king of graves and grave for kings,
Imperious supreme996 of all mortal things.
‘No, no,’ quoth she, ‘sweet Death, I did but jest,
Yet pardon me I felt a kind of fear
Whenas999 I met the boar, that bloody beast,
Which knows no pity, but is still severe1000:
Then, gentle shadow1001 — truth I must confess —
I railed on1002 thee, fearing my love’s decease.
‘ ’Tis not my fault, the boar provoked my tongue:
Be wreaked1004 on him, invisible commander,
’Tis he, foul creature, that hath done thee wrong —
I did but act1006, he’s author of thy slander.
Grief hath two tongues and never woman yet
Could rule them both without ten women’s wit.’
Thus hoping that Adonis is alive,
Her rash suspect1010 she doth extenuate,
And that his beauty may the better thrive,
With death she humbly doth insinuate1012,
Tells him of trophies1013, statues, tombs and stories,
His victories, his triumphs and his glories.
‘O Jove1015,’ quoth she, ‘how much a fool was I
To be of such a weak and silly mind
To wail his death who lives and must not die
Till mutual overthrow of mortal kind1018!
For he being dead, with him is beauty slain,
And, beauty dead, black chaos comes again.
‘Fie, fie, fond1021 love, thou art as full of fear
As one with treasure laden, hemmed with1022 thieves:
Trifles, unwitnessèd with eye or ear,
Thy coward heart with false bethinking1024 grieves.’
Even at this word she hears a merry horn,
Whereat she leaps that was but late1026 forlorn.
As falcons to the lure1027, away she flies,
The grass stoops not she treads on it so light,
And in her haste unfortunately1029 spies
The foul boar’s conquest on her fair delight,
Which seen, her eyes, are murdered with the view,
Like stars ashamed of day, themselves withdrew,
Or as the snail, whose tender horns being hit,
Shrinks backward in his shelly cave with pain,
And there, all smothered up, in shade doth sit,
Long after fearing to creep forth again:
So at his bloody view her eyes are fled
Into the deep dark cabins1038 of her head,
Where they resign their office1039 and their light
To the disposing1040 of her troubled brain,
Who bids them still1041 consort with ugly night
And never wound the heart with looks again,
Who1043, like a king perplexèd in his throne,
By their suggestion1044 gives a deadly groan,
Whereat each tributary subject1045 quakes,
As when the wind, imprisoned in the ground1046,
Struggling for passage, earth’s foundation shakes,
Which with cold terror doth men’s minds confound1048.
This mutiny each part doth so surprise1049
That from their dark beds once more leap her eyes,
And, being opened, threw unwilling light1051
Upon the wide wound that the boar had trenched1052
In his soft flank1053, whose wonted lily white
With purple1054 tears, that his wound wept, had drenched.
No flower was nigh, no grass, herb, leaf or weed,
But stole1056 his blood and seemed with him to bleed.
This solemn sympathy poor Venus noteth.
Over one shoulder doth she hang her head,
Dumbly she passions1059, franticly she doteth,
She thinks he could not die, he is not dead:
Her voice is stopped, her joints forget to bow1061,
Her eyes are mad that they have wept till now1062.
> Upon his hurt she looks so steadfastly
That her sight dazzling1064 makes the wound seem three,
And then she reprehends her mangling1065 eye
That makes more gashes where no breach should be:
His face seems twain, each several1067 limb is doubled,
For oft the eye mistakes, the brain being troubled.
‘My tongue cannot express my grief for one,
And yet’, quoth she, ‘behold two Adons dead!
My sighs are blown away, my salt tears gone,
Mine eyes are turned to fire, my heart to lead.
Heavy heart’s lead melt at mine eyes’ red fire!
So shall I die by drops of hot desire.
‘Alas, poor world, what treasure hast thou lost!
What face remains alive that’s worth the viewing?
Whose tongue is music now? What canst thou boast
Of things long since, or any thing ensuing?
The flowers are sweet, their colours fresh and trim1079,
But true sweet beauty lived and died with him.
‘Bonnet1081 nor veil henceforth no creature wear!
Nor sun nor1082 wind will ever strive to kiss you,
Having no fair1083 to lose, you need not fear:
The sun doth scorn you and the wind doth hiss you,
But when Adonis lived, sun and sharp air
Lurked like two thieves to rob him of his fair,