With true-love-knots and flourishes,
That shall infuse eternal spring, And everlasting flourishing:
Drink ev'ry letter on't in stum,
And make it brisk champaign become: Where'er you tread, your foot shall set The primrose and the violet:
All spices, perfumes, and sweet powders, Shall borrow from your breath their odours: Nature her charter shall renew,
And take all lives of things from you!
The world depend upon your eye,
you frown upon it, die: Only our loves shall still survive, New worlds and natures to out-live; And, like to heralds' moons, remain All crescents, without change or wane. Hold, hold, quoth she; no more of this, Sir Knight; you take your aim amiss : For you will find it a hard chapter To catch me with poetic rapture;
In which your mastery of art Doth shew itself, and not your heart: Nor will you raise in mine combustion By dint of high heroic fustian.
Avec des lacs d'amours charmants Je les rendrai plus florissants; De ce nom qui fera ma gloire
A chaque lettre je vais boire; (33) Et la plus mauvaise boisson Sera Champagne, avec ce nom. Les violettes et les roses
Sur vos traces vont être écloses; De votre haleine eaux de senteur Prendront désormais leur odeur; Sur vous et sur votre figure Se modélera la nature;
Et toute entière périra,
Quand votre sourcil froncera; Et mon amour, toujours le même, Verra naître un nouveau systême, Comme lune en blason enfin, Toujours croissant et sans déclin.
Arrêtez, dit-elle, beau sire, Finissez ce piètre délire; Je vois que très-mal vous visez; Ne croyez pas que vous puissiez
Rien gaguer sur moi par ces phrases, Et ces poétiques extases,
Qui font voir votre habileté Sans montrer de sincérité.
On ne me prendra de la vie
She that with poetry is won,
Is but a desk to write upon;
And what men say of her, they mean
No more than on the thing they lean. Some with Arabian spices strive T'embalm her cruelly alive;
Or season her, as French cooks use Their haut-gouts, bouillies, or ragouts: Use her so barbarously ill,
To grind her lips upon a mill, Until the facet doublet doth
Fit their rhymes rather than her mouth : Her mouth compar'd t' an oyster's, with A row of pearl in't, 'stead of teeth. Others make posies of her cheeks, Where red and whitest colours mix; In which the lily and the rose For indian lake and ceruse goes: The sun and moon by her bright eyes Eclips'd, and darken'd in the skies, Are but black patches, that she wears, Cut into suns, and moons, and stars: By which astrologers, as well As those in heav'n above, can tell What strange events they do foreshow
Par lieux communs de poésie. Celle qui s'y laisse attraper Justement se peut comparer Au pupitre fait pour écrire; Car, de cet amoureux délire, Elle n'est non plus le sujet, Que ce sur lequel on le fait.
Les uns l'embaument toute en vie
Avec épices d'Arabie;
Ils l'assaisonnent à leurs goûts, Comme cuisiniers font ragoûts. Ils mettent ses lèvres en poudre A force de les faire moudre; (34) Non pour l'orner, mais seulement Pour faire un vers plus aisément. A l'huître sa bouche ils comparent; Pour dents, de perles ils la parent; Et chaque joue est un bouquet, Qui de rouge et de blanc est fait, Où brillent le lys et la rose, Laque et céruse on les suppose; Par le brillant de ses beaux yeux, On fait éclipser dans les cieux Lune et soleil, dont la figure En devient bien autant obscure Que mouches en lune ou soleil Qu'elle met sur son teint vermeil; Dont l'astrologue fait usage,
Unto her under-world below.
Her voice, the music of the spheres, So loud, it deafens mortals' ears, As wise philosophers have thought, And that's the cause we hear it not. This has been done by some, who those Th' ador'd in rhyme, would kill in prose; And in those ribbons would have hung Of which melodiously they sung;
That have the hard fate to write best Of those still that deserve it least; It matters not how false, or forc'd, So the best things be said o' th' worst: It goes for nothing when 'tis said, Only the arrow's drawn to th' head, Whether it be a swan or goose They level at so shepherds use
To set the same mark on the hip
Both of their sound and rotten sheep:
For wits that carry low or wide,
Must be aim'd higher or beside
The mark, which else they ne'er come nigh, But when they take their aim awry.
But I do wonder you should choose
This way t' attack me with your muse,
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