A Lady Sweet and Kind

THERE is a Lady sweet and kind,

Was never face so pleased my mind;
I did but see her passing by,

And yet I love her till I die.

Her gesture, motion, and her smiles,
Her wit, her voice, my heart beguiles,
Beguiles my heart, I know not why,
And yet I love her till I die...

Cupid is winged and doth range

Her country so, my love doth change:
But change she earth, or change she sky,

Yet will I love her till I die.

Cherry Ripe

Anonymous

HERE is a garden in her face

THERE

Where roses and white lilies grow;

A heavenly paradise is that place
Wherein all pleasant fruits do flow:
There cherries grow which none may buy
Till "Cherry ripe " themselves do cry.

Those cherries fairly do enclose
Of orient pearl a double row,
Which when her lovely laughter shows,
They look like rose-buds fill'd with snow;
Yet them nor peer nor prince can buy
Till "Cherry ripe " themselves do cry.

Her eyes like angels watch them still,
Her brows like bended bows do stand,
Threat'ning with piercing frowns to kill
All that attempt with eye or hand
Those sacred cherries to come nigh,
Till "Cherry ripe" themselves do cry.

Thomas Campion

A Description of a Most Noble Lady

Adviewed by John Heywood, presently; who advertising her years, as face, saith of her thus, in much eloquent phrase:

'IVE place, ye ladies! all begone;

GIV

Show not yourselves at all.

For why? behold! there cometh one
Whose face yours all blank shall.

The virtue of her looks

Excels the precious stone;

Ye need none other books
To read, or look upon.

In each of her two eyes

There smiles a naked boy;

It would you all suffice

To see those lamps of joy.

If all the world were sought full far,
Who could find such a wight?
Her beauty twinkleth like a star
Within the frosty night.

Her colour comes and goes
With such a goodly grace,
More ruddy than the rose —
Within her lively face.

Amongst her youthful years
She triumphs over age;
And yet she still appears

Both witty, grave and sage.

I think nature hath lost her mould
Where she her form did take;
Or else I doubt that nature could
So fair a creature make.

She may be well compared
Unto the phoenix kind;

Whose like hath not been heard
That any now can find.

In life a Dian chaste;

In truth Penelope;

In word and deed steadfast

What need I more to say?

At Bacchus' feast none may her meet;
Or yet at any wanton play;
Nor gazing in the open street,
Or wandering, as astray.

The mirth that she doth use

Is mixed with shamefastness;

All vices she eschews,

And hateth idleness.

It is a world to see

How virtue can repair, And deck such honesty

In her that is so fair.

Great suit to vice may some allure
That thinks to make no fault;
We see a fort had need be sure
Which many doth assault.

Three Roses

WHE

WHEN the buds began to burst,
Long ago, with Rose the First

I was walking: joyous then

Far above all other men,

Till before us up there stood
Britonfery's oaken wood,

Whispering, "Happy as thou art,
Happiness and thou must part.”
Many summers have gone by
Since a Second Rose and I

(Rose from that same stem) have told
This and other tales of old.

She upon her wedding-day

Carried home my tenderest lay;

From her lap I now have heard
Gleeful, chirping, Rose the Third.
Not for her this hand of mine

Rhyme with nuptial wreath shall twine;
Cold and torpid it must lie,

Mute the tongue, and closed the eye.

Marguerite

W. S. Landor

LAUGH, my friends, and without blame

Lightly quit what lightly came;

Rich to-morrow as to-day,

Spend as madly as you may!

I, with little land to stir,
Am the exacter labourer.

Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!