Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.
John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester. 16471680416. To His Mistress (After Quarles)
WHY dost thou shade thy lovely face? O why | |
Does that eclipsing hand of thine deny | |
The sunshine of the Sun’s enlivening eye? | |
Without thy light what light remains in me? | |
Thou art my life; my way, my light ‘s in thee; | 5 |
I live, I move, and by thy beams I see. | |
Thou art my life—if thou but turn away | |
My life ‘s a thousand deaths. Thou art my way— | |
Without thee, Love, I travel not but stray. | |
My light thou art—without thy glorious sight | 10 |
My eyes are darken’d with eternal night. | |
My Love, thou art my way, my life, my light. | |
Thou art my way; I wander if thou fly. | |
Thou art my light; if hid, how blind am I! | |
Thou art my life; if thou withdraw’st, I die. | 15 |
My eyes are dark and blind, I cannot see: | |
To whom or whither should my darkness flee, | |
But to that light?—and who ‘s that light but thee? | |
If I have lost my path, dear lover, say, | |
Shall I still wander in a doubtful way? | 20 |
Love, shall a lamb of Israel’s sheepfold stray? | |
My path is lost, my wandering steps do stray; | |
I cannot go, nor can I safely stay; | |
Whom should I seek but thee, my path, my way? | |
And yet thou turn’st thy face away and fly’st me! | 25 |
And yet I sue for grace and thou deny’st me! | |
Speak, art thou angry, Love, or only try’st me? | |
Thou art the pilgrim’s path, the blind man’s eye, | |
The dead man’s life. On thee my hopes rely: | |
If I but them remove, I surely die. | 30 |
Dissolve thy sunbeams, close thy wings and stay! | |
See, see how I am blind, and dead, and stray! | |
—O thou that art my life, my light, my way! | |
Then work thy will! If passion bid me flee, | |
My reason shall obey, my wings shall be | 35 |
Stretch’d out no farther than from me to thee! |