love poem

I.

I Love Variety, 'tis true,
But for your sake (my Dear) alone;
Variety I find in you,
Who have all Woman's Charms in one.

II.

Your Humour varies like your Look,
Which you so daily change to me,
That if with Change I were not took,
Constant to you I cou'd not be.

III.

To please Men more, you change your Dress,
And since all else, why not your Mind?

I.

For our Love, you requite us all,
Repaying Love to none;
Since still, your Scorn is general,
You Wrong not any one;

II.

One Way your Rigour pleases me,
If I cannot have you,
Nor in your Love can Happy be
I'm so, since none are so;

III.

For if your Love were Singular,
'Twere Public Injury;
Since none of you deserving are,

Veiled by the shadows of obscurest night,
All Dian's host are shining unrevealed,
Save one fair star on heaven's unbounded field,
All lonely, lovely, fascinating, bright;
How clearly tremulous it hails the sight!
As if 'twould smile away the clouds that lie
Athwart its glorious sisters of the sky,
Prohibiting our earth their holy light:
So, as I stumble on the path of life,
Without one voice to cheer, one heart to love —
When all is darkness round me, and above,
And every bitter feeling is at strife —

I.

Let me thy Kindness but revive,
Who Dy'd long since for Love of thee;
My Songs shall make thy Beauty live.
Altho' that it has Murther'd me;

II.

As Arrows shot back, on the Foe,
By them, at whom they first were aim'd,
Of their Defence, Offensive grow,
When by their own Arms, they are maim'd;

III.

My Song's so meant, for my Love's Aid,
In overcoming Cruel thee;

I.

The Grave and Dull I did despise,
Now most my Spleen and Envy move;
Whom Want of Sense has made so Wise,
As to live Ignorant of Love;

II.

So Fools, the Wise Turks reverence,
Whose Want of Sense and Wit, secures
Them from those Troubles, too much Sense,
For the too Knowing still procures;

III.

Since Fools in this World, as elsewhere

I.

True Love, sure, needs no kind of Aid,
From Vows, Tears, Oaths, to make it good;
Love but in Silence best is made,
And by it, better understood;

II.

Like Hypocrites, so those of Love,
Are by Eye, Lip-Devotion known;
Less their True Faith, and Worship prove,
As more Appearance of 'em's shown;

III.

Since True Love, like True Piety,
Does still all Ostentation shun;

C ARY'S Tune .

When I by faith my Saviour see,
And think what he has done for me,
It strikes my soul with sweet surprise,
And fills with tears my wond'ring eyes! —
His blood was shed to set me free
From everlasting misery!

On all his beauties while I gaze,
And see them in his suff'rings blaze,
My heart, like wax before the fire,
Melts into love and strong desire. —
His blood was shed to set me free
From everlasting misery!

Was it for me those hands were torn?

I.

Me ne'r for being fickle, blame,
Since thou but alter'd art, not I;
Who, true to Love and Beauty am,
Thy Change makes my Inconstancy;
Who, since not now the same to me,
Mak'st me now not the same to thee;

II.

Because to Beauty I am true,
When that left thee, I left thee too,
I paid thee my Love, when thy Due;
But since it does another's grow,
Who now seems Fair, as once you were,
I'm true so, to thy Charms, in her;

III.

Since Beauty's Due, Love is alone,

C ELIA cannot you afford,
One consolatory Word?
Must I still the Burthen bear,
Ever love, and yet desair?
Never, never Comfort know?
Cruel Celia and my Wo;
Terminate at once my Fate,
And let me hear you say, You Hate.

Once to love is not a Crime,
If 'till Death we constant prove;
But to love a second Time,
Shows, we never once did love.

II.

Love I do! and love I must!
While my Life and Sense endure;
And this Form must turn to Dust,
'Ere my Passion knows a Cure.

III.

Never can my Torments cease,
Or my Joys return again;
Nor can Love, those Wrongs redress,