IDENTITY IN LOVE

O, HOW thy worth with manners may I sing,

When thou art all the better part of me?

What can mine own praise to mine own self bring? And what is't but mine own when I praise thee?

Even for this let us divided live,

And our dear love lose name of single one,
That by this separation I may give

That due to thee which thou deserv'st alone.

O Absence, what a torment would'st thou prove,
Were it not thy sour leisure gave sweet leave
To entertain the time with thoughts of love,
Which time and thoughts so sweetly doth deceive,

And that thou teachest how to make one twain, By praising him here who doth hence remain !

OF SHAKESPEARE

95

ALL FOR LOVE

TAKE all my loves, my Love, yea, take them

all;

What hast thou then more than thou hadst before? No love, my Love, that thou mayst true love call; All mine was thine, before thou hadst this more.

Then if for my love thou my love receivest,
I cannot blame thee for my love thou usest ;
But yet be blamed, if thou thyself deceivest
By wilful taste of what thyself refusest.

I do forgive thy robbery, gentle thief,
Although thou steal thee all my poverty;
And yet, love knows, it is a greater grief
To bear love's wrong than hate's known injury.

Lascivious grace, in whom all ill well shows,
Kill me with spites; yet we must not be foes.

A PARDON

THOSE petty wrongs that liberty commits,
When I am sometime absent from thy heart,

Thy beauty and thy years full well befits,
For still temptation follows where thou art.

Gentle thou art, and therefore to be won,
Beauteous thou art, therefore to be assailéd ;
And when a woman woos, what woman's son
Will sourly leave her till she have prevailéd?

Ay me! but yet thou mightst my seat forbear,
And chide thy beauty and thy straying youth,
Who lead thee in their riot even there

Where thou art forced to break a twofold truth,

Hers, by thy beauty tempting her to thee,

Thine, by thy beauty being false to me.

THEFT NO ROBBERY

'HAT thou hast her, it is not all my grief;

THAT

And yet it may be said I loved her dearly; That she hath thee, is of my wailing chief, A loss in love that touches me more nearly.

Loving offenders, thus I will excuse ye :

Thou dost love her, because thou know'st I love

her;

And for my sake even so doth she abuse me,

Suffering my friend for my sake to approve her.

If I lose thee, my loss is my love's gain,
And losing her, my friend hath found that loss;
Both find each other, and I lose both twain,
And both for my sake lay on me this cross:

But here's the joy; my friend and I are one;
Sweet flattery! then she loves but me alone.

H

98

SONGS AND SONNETS

SHADOW AND TRUTH.

WHEN most I wink, then do mine eyes best

see,

For all the day they view things unrespected;
But when I sleep, in dreams they look on thee,
And darkly bright are bright in dark directed.

Then thou, whose shadow shadows doth make

bright,

How would thy shadow's form form happy show
To the clear day with thy much clearer light,
When to unseeing eyes thy shade shines so!

How would, I say, mine eyes be blesséd made
By looking on thee in the living day,
When in dead night thy fair imperfect shade
Through heavy sleep on sightless eyes doth stay!

All days are nights to see till I see thee,

And nights bright days when dreams do show

thee me.