William Bosworth (1607–1650?)

SEE’ST not, my love, with what a grace

The Spring resembles thy sweet face?

Here let us sit, and in these bowers

Receive the odours of the flowers,

For Flora, by thy beauty woo’d, conspires thy good.

See how she sends her fragrant sweet,

And doth this homage to thy feet,

Bending so low her stooping head

To kiss the ground where thou dost tread,

And all her flowers proudly meet, to kiss thy feet.

Then let us walk, my dearest love,

And on this carpet strictly prove

Each other’s vow; from thy request

No other love invades my breast.

For how can I contemn that fire which Gods admire?

To crop that rose why dost thou seek,

When there’s a purer in thy cheek?

Like coral held in thy fair hands,

Or blood and milk that mingled stands:

To whom the Powers and grace have given, a type of Heaven.

Yon lily stooping t’wards this place,

Is a pale shadow for thy face,

Under which veil doth seem to rush

Modest Endymion’s ruddy blush.

A blush, indeed, more pure and fair than lilies are.

Glance on those flowers thy radiant eyes,

Through which clear beams they’ll sympathise

Reflective love, to make them far

More glorious than th’ Hesperian star,

For every swain amazèd lies, and gazing dies.

See how these silly flowers twine,

With sweet embracings, and combine,

Striving with curious looms to set

Their pale and red into a net,

To show how pure desire doth rest for ever blest.

Why wilt thou then unconstant be?

T’ infringe the laws of amity,

And so much disrespect my heart

To derogate from what thou art?

When in harmonious love there is Elysian bliss.