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Sir Robert Ayton

[An Exhortation]

If high excess of irrelenting smart
Inforce not words to fayle and thoughts to faint,
My love would now convince both tongue and heart
To say farewell unto my sweetest saint;
But while affection would my woes reveale,
And say unto my sweetest heart farewell,
My senses are soe suffocat'd with care
They sigh, they grone, then sayes nothing but faire.
Then, fairest faire, read in my sighes and teares
The secreete anguish of thy dyeing slave,
Who for the love unto thy worth he beares
Hath consecrat'd his soule unto the grave,
And now is forc'd from thy dissdaines to goe
Where death may end his never-ending woe;
Yet swearing still by all the lights above
Ten thousand deaths shall never end his love.
And thus resolv'd I only begg of the
Amidds my sadd exile, this poore releife,
That if thou cannot thinke with love on mee,
Thou would with pitty pause upon my grieffe;
Or if perhapps this little seeme too much,
As, ah! I feare thy rigour shall be such,
That when some freind my name to minde shall call,
Thou'll only sigh and wish me well, that's all.

[Love's Provocation]

Unhappy eyes, why did you gaze again
Upon those fatall, loveing, fyring spheires?
Know you not well, her fyre flaughts would constraine
fyre flaughts: lightining flashes
Your cristall circles to dissolve in teares?
And you againe, even as unhappy eares,
Why did her painted phrase your fort surprise?
Know you not well that in her lipps she beares
A charming host of perswasive replyes?
Oh, eyes and eares, that you had been more wise
And had not waken'd up a sleeping flame!
Yet since the fault is don, my comfort lyes
Into the merritts of a matchless dame,
For who soe loves her not, that heares or sees,
Is neither worthy to have eares nor eyes.

A Sonnet Left in a Gentlewoman's Looking Glasse

To veiw thy beauty well, if thou be wise,
Come not to gaze upon this glass of thyne,
But come and looke upon these eyes of myne
Where thou shalt see thy true resemblance twyce;
Or if thou thinkes that thou profaines thy eyes 
When on my wretched eyes they daigne to shyne,
Looke on my heart wherein, as in a shryne,
The lively picture of thy beauty lyes; 
Or if thy harmeless modesty thinkes shame 
To gaze upon the horrours of my heart,
Come read those lynes, and reading see in them
The trophies of thy beautie and my smart;
Or if to none of those thou'l daigne to come,
Weepe eyes, breake heart, and you my verse be dumbe.

[Farewell to Life and Love]

I bid farewell into the world and thee:
To thee, because thou art extreame unkinde;
Unto the world, because the world to me
Is nothing, since I cannott move thy minde.
Were any mercy in thy soule inshrin'd,
Could sighes or teares make soft thy flinty heart,
I could perhapps more easily be inclin'd
To spend my dayes with the then to depart.
But since thou knowes not Cupid's golden dart,
But hath been wounded with a shaft of lead,
It is but folly to pretend his art
To sue for favour, when I find but feade.
Soe farewell, nimph, farewell for aye as now;
And wel'come death, more mercifull then thou.

[On Loss]

Loe, how the sailer in a stormy night
Wailes and complaines till he the starr perceive
Whose situation and assured hight
Should guide him through the strong and watrie cave;
As many motives, wretched soule, I have
For to regrat, as few for to rejoyce
In seeing all things, once this sight I crave,
Since I the loadstare of my life did loose.
And which is worse, amids those many woes,
Amidds my paines which passes all compare,
Noe helpe, noe hope, noe comfort, noe repose,
Noe sunn appeares to cleare those clouds of care,
Save this: that Fortune neither may nor dare
Make my misshapps more hapless then they are.

[On The River Tweed]

Faire famous flood, which sometyme did devyde,
But now conjoynes two diadems in one,
Suspend thy pace and some more softly slyde,
Since wee have made the trinchman of our mone;
trinchman: spokesman
And since non's left but thy report alone
To show the world our captaines last farewell, 
That courtesye I now when wee are gon
Perhapps your lord the sea will it reveale;
And you againe the same will not conceale,
But straight proclaim't through all his bremish bounds, 
bremish: violent
Till his high tydes these flowing tydeings tell,
And soe will send them with his murmering sounds
To that religious place whose stately walls
Does keepe the heart which all our hearts inthralls.

[A Valediction]

Then will thou goe and leave me here?
Ah, doe not soe, my dearest deare!
The sunns departure clouds the sky,
But thy departure makes mee dye.
Thou canst not goe but with my heart,
Even that which is my cheifest part;
Then with two hearts thou shall be gone,
And I shall rest behinde with none.
Prevent the danger of this ill --
Goe not away, stay with mee still!
Ile bath thy lipps with kisses then,
Expecting increase back againe.
And if thou needes will goe away,
Ah! leave one heart with mee to stay;
Take myne, let thine in pawne remaine,
That thou will quickly come againe.
Mean tyme, my part shall be to mourne,
To tell the houres till thou returne;
My eyes shall be but eyes to weepe,
And neither eyes to see nor sleepe.
And if perchance there lidds I close
To ease them with some false repose,
Yet still my longing dreames shall be
Of nothing in the world but the.

[Upone a Gentlewoman that painted]

Pamphilia hath a number of good parts
Which commendation to her worth imparts,
But amongst all, in one she doth excell,
That she can paint incomparablie well;
And yet soe modest that if prais'd for this
She'll sweare she does not know what painting is,
But straight will blush with such a portred grace
That one would thinke vermillion dyed her face.
One of her pictures I have oft tymes seene
And would have sworne that it her selfe had beene, 
Yet when I bid her it on mee bestow,
I sweare I heard the pictur's selfe say noe.
What, thinke you this a prodigie? Its none:
The painter and the picture were both one.

[Vpon Love]

There is no worldly pleasure here below
Which by experience doth not folly prove,
But amongst all the follyes that I know
The sweetest folly in the world is love;
But not that passion which with fooles consent
Above the reason beares imperious sway,
Making there lifetime a perpetuall Lent
As if a man were borne to fast and pray;
Noe, that is not the humour I approve
As either yeilding pleasure or promotion.
I like a milde and lukewarm zeale in love,
Although I doe not like it in devotion;
For it hath noe coherence with my creed
To thinke that lovers dye as they pretend,
If all that say they dye had dyed indeed
Sure long ere now the world had had an end.
Besides, wee neede not love unless wee please:
Noe destinye can force mans disposition,
And how can any dye of that disease
Whereof himselfe may be his owne physitian?
But some seemes soe distracted of there witts
That I would thinke it but a veniall sinn
To take some of those innocents that sitts
In Beddlam out, and put some lovers in.
And some men, rather than incurr the slander
Of true appostates, will false martyrs prove;
But I am neither Iphis nor Leander --
Ile neither drowne nor hang my selfe for love.
Methinks a wisemans actions should be such
As allwayes yeildes to reasons best advise:
Now for to love too little or too much
Are both extreames, and all extreames are vice.
Yet have I been a lover by report:
Yea, I have dyed for love as others doe;
But, prais'd be God, it was in such a sort
That I revived within an houre or two.
Thus have I liv'd, thus have I lov'd till now,
And findes noe reason to repent mee yet,
And whosoever otherwise will doe,
His courage is as little as his witt.

[On Love]

Lov's like a game at Irish, where the dye
Of maids affection doth by fortune fly,
Which, when you thinke you certaine of the same,
Proves but att best a doubtfull aftergame;
For if they finde yoar fancy in a blott,
Its two to one if then they take you nott.
But, being gamesters, you must boldly venter,
And wher you see the pointe lye open, enter.
Beleive mee one thing, nothing brings about
A game halfe lost soe soone as holding out;
And next to holding out, this you shall finde,
There's nothing worse then entering still behinde.
Yet doth not all in happy entrance lye:
When you are on, you must throw home and hye.
If you throw low and weake, beleive mee then,
Doe what you can, they will be bearing men;
And if you looke not all the better on,
They will play false, beare two instead of one.

[The Rejection]

Shall feare to seeme untrue
To vowes of constant duty
Make mee disgest disdaines undue
From an inconstant beautie?
Noe, I doe not affect
In vowes to seeme soe holy
That I would have the world to check
My constancy with folly.
Let her call breach of vow
What I call just repentance;
I count him base and braine-sick, too, 
That dotes on coy acquaintance.
Thus if out of her snaire
At last I doe unfold mee,
Accuse her selfe that caught mee there
And knew not how to hold mee.
And if I rebell prove
Against my will I doe it,
Yet can I heate as well as love
When Reason binds mee to it.

[Upon his unconstant Mistress]

Why did I wrong my judgment soe
As to affect where I did know
There was noe hold for to be taken?
That which her heart thirsts after most,
If once of it her hope can boast,
Straite by her folly is forsaken.
Thus while I still persue in vaine,
Methinkes I turne a childe againe,
And of my shadow am a-chaseing;
For all her favours are to mee
Like apparitions which I see,
Yet never can come neare th'imbraceing.
Oft have I wish'd that there had beene
Some Almanack whereby to have seene
When love with her had beene in season;
But I perceive there is noe art
Can finde the epact of a heart
That loves by chance and not by reason.
Yet will I not for this dispaire,
But time her humour may prepare
To love him who is now neglected,
For what unto my constancy
Is now deny'd, one day may be
From her inconstancy expected.

[Constancy: A Song]

When thou didst thinke I did not love,
Then thou didst dote on mee;
Now when thou findst that I doe prove
As kinde as kinde can bee,
Love dyes in thee.
What way to fyre the mercurie
Of thy inconstant mynde?
Methinkes it were good policie
For mee to turne unkind
To make thee kinde.
Yet will I not good nature strayne
To buy at soe greate cost,
That which before I did obtaine
I make accompt almost
That it is lost.
And though I might my selfe excuse
By imitateing the,
Yet will I noe examples use
That may bewray in mee
Lightness to bee.
But since I gave the once my heart,
My constancy shall show
That though thou play the womans part
And from a freind turne foe,
Men doe not soe.

Vpon Platonick Love: To Mistress Cicely Crofts, Maide of Honor

O that I were all soule, that I might prove
For you as fitt a love
As you are for an angell, for I vow
None but pure spiritts are fitt loves for you.
You'r all etheriall; there is in you noe dross
Nor any part that's gross;
Your coursest part is like the curious lawne
O're vestall relicts for a covering drawne.
Your other part, part of the purest fire
That e're Heaven did inspire,
Makes every thought that is refined by it
A quintessence of goodnes and of witt.
Thus doe your raptures reach to that degree
In Loves phylosiphy
That you can figure to your selfe a fyre
Void of all heate, a love without desire.
Nor in divinity doe you goe less;
You thinke and yow profess
That soules may have a plenitude of joy,
Although there bodyes never meete t'enjoy.
But I must needes confess I doe not finde
The motions of my minde
Soe purifyed as yet, but at there best
My body claims in them some interest:
I hold a perfyt joy makes all our parts
As joyfull as our hearts;
My senses tell me if I please not them
My love is butt a dottage or a dreame.
How shall wee then agree? You may descend,
But will not, to my end.
I faine would tune my fancy to your key,
But cannot reach to that abstracted way.
There rests but this: that while we sojourne here
Our bodyes may draw nere,
And when our joyes they can noe more extend,
Then lett our soules beginn where they did end.

To his coy Mistres

What uthers doth discourage and dismay
Is unto me a pastyme and a play:
I sport in hir deneyalls, and doe know
Weman love best that does love least in show.
Tuo sudden favours may abate delight;
When modest coynes sharpes the appetite
I grow the hotter for hir cold neglect,
And more inflam'd when sho showes least respect.
Heat may aryse from rocks, from flints so fyre;
So from hir coldnes I doe strik desyre.
Sho, knoweinge this perhapes, resolves to try
My faith and patience, offeringe to denay
What e're I aske of hir, that I may be
More taken with hir, for hir slightinge me.
When fishes play with baites, best, anglers say,
To mak them bite, is drawe the baite away;
So dallies sho with me till, to my smart,
Both bait and hooke stickes fastened in my hart.
And now I am become hir foolishe prey,
And, that sho knowes I cannot break away,
Let hir resolve no longer to be free
From Cupides bondes, and bind hir self to me,
Nor let hir wex me longer with dispair
That they be crewell that be younge and faire.
It is the old, the creased and the blake
That ar unkynd and for affectione lacke.
I'le ty hir eyes with lynes, hir eares with moanes;
Hir marble hart I'le pearce with hydious groanes,
That nather eyes, eares, hart sall be at rest
Till sho forsaike hir sier to love me best;
Nor will I raise my seige nor leave my feild
Till I have mead my waliant mistres yeeld.
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