Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904.
Amoretti and EpithalamionSonnet LXXXI. Fair is my love, when her fair golden hairs
Edmund Spenser (1552?–1599)F
With the loose wind waving ye chance to mark;
Fair, when the rose in her red cheeks appears;
Or in her eyes the fire of love doth spark.
Fair, when her breast, like a rich laden bark,
With precious merchandise she forth doth lay;
Fair, when that cloud of pride, which oft doth dark
Her goodly light, with smiles she drives away.
But fairest she, when so she doth display
The gate with pearls and rubies richly dight;
Through which her words so wise do make their way
To bear the message of her gentle spright.
The rest be work of nature’s wonderment:
But this the work of heart’s astonishment.