84
COWLEY'S POEMS.
Sweet as lovers' freshest kisses,
Or their riper following blisses,
Graceful, cleanly, smooth, and round,
All with Venus' girdle bound;
And thy life was all the while
Kind and gentle as thy style.
The smooth-pac'd hours of every day
Glided numerously away.
Like thy verse each hour did pass;
Sweet and short, like that, it was.
Some do but their youth allow me,
Just what they by nature owe me,
The time that's mine, and not their own,
The certain tribute of my crown:
When they grow old, they grow to be
Too busy, or too wise, for me.
Thou wert wiser, and didst know
None too wise for Love can grow;
Love was with thy life entwin'd,
Close as heat with fire is join'd;
A powerful brand prescrib'd the date
Of thine, like Meleager's, fate.
Th'antiperistasis of age
More enflam'd thy amorous rage;
Thy silver hairs yielded me more
Than even golden curls before.
Had I the power of creation,
As I have of generation,
Where I the matter must obey,
And cannot work plate out of clay,
Or their riper following blisses,
Graceful, cleanly, smooth, and round,
All with Venus' girdle bound;
And thy life was all the while
Kind and gentle as thy style.
The smooth-pac'd hours of every day
Glided numerously away.
Like thy verse each hour did pass;
Sweet and short, like that, it was.
Some do but their youth allow me,
Just what they by nature owe me,
The time that's mine, and not their own,
The certain tribute of my crown:
When they grow old, they grow to be
Too busy, or too wise, for me.
Thou wert wiser, and didst know
None too wise for Love can grow;
Love was with thy life entwin'd,
Close as heat with fire is join'd;
A powerful brand prescrib'd the date
Of thine, like Meleager's, fate.
Th'antiperistasis of age
More enflam'd thy amorous rage;
Thy silver hairs yielded me more
Than even golden curls before.
Had I the power of creation,
As I have of generation,
Where I the matter must obey,
And cannot work plate out of clay,
