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Home  »  Elizabethan Sonnets  »  Sonnet XXXVIII. Who lives enthralled to Cupid and his flame

Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904.

Phillis

Sonnet XXXVIII. Who lives enthralled to Cupid and his flame

Thomas Lodge (1558–1625)

WHO lives enthralled to Cupid and his flame,

From day to day is changed in sundry sort;

The proof whereof myself may well report,

Who oft transformed by him may teach the same.

I first was turned into a wounded hart,

That bare the bloody arrow in my side;

Then to a swan that midst the waters glide,

With piteous voice presaged my deadly smart;

Eftsoons I waxed a faint and fading flower;

Then was I made a fountain sudden dry,

Distilling all my tears from troubled eye;

Now am I salamander by his power,

Living in flames, but hope ere long to be

A voice, to talk my mistress’ majesty.