MICHAEL DRAYTON

(1563-1631)

IF chaste and pure devotion of my youth,1
Or glory of my April-springing years,
Unfeigned love in naked simple truth,
A thousand vows, a thousand sighs and tears :
Of if a world of faithful service done,

Words, thoughts, and deeds devoted to her honour,
Or eyes that have beheld her as their sun,
With admiration ever looking on her ;

A life that never joyed but in her love,

A soul that ever hath adored her name, A faith that time and fortune could not move, A Muse that unto heaven hath raised her fame ; Though these, nor these, deserved to be embraced, Yet, fair unkind, too good to be disgraced.2

1 From the 53 Amours of 1594; not reprinted by Drayton in his subsequent editions.

2 Understand 'they are' before 'too good',

MICHAEL DRAYTON

CUPID CONJURED

THOU purblind Boy, since thou hast been so slack
To wound her heart, whose eyes have wounded

me;

And suffered her to glory in

my

wrack :

Thus to my aid, I lastly conjure thee!
By hellish Styx (by which the Thunderer swears) ;
By thy fair Mother's unavoided power;

By Hecate's names; by Proserpine's sad tears
When she was rapt to the infernal bower;
By thine own lovèd Psyche's; by the fires

Spent on thine altars, flaming up to heaven; By all true lovers' sighs, vows, and desires ; By all the wounds that ever thou hast given; I conjure thee, by all that I have named,

To make her love: or, Cupid, be thou damned!

MICHAEL DRAYTON

DEAR, why should you command me to my rest,
When now the night doth summon all to sleep?
Methinks, this time becometh lovers best;
Night was ordained together friends to keep :
How happy are all other living things,

Which, though the day disjoin by several flight,
The quiet evening yet together brings,
And each returns unto his Love at night!
O thou that art so courteous else to all,

Why shouldst thou, Night, abuse me only thus, That every creature to his kind doth call, And yet 'tis thou dost only sever us? Well could I wish it would be ever day; If when night comes you bid me go away.

WHY should

MICHAEL DRAYTON

་་་་

your fair eyes with such sovereign grace Disperse their rays on every vulgar spirit, Whilst I in darkness, in the self-same place, Get not one glance to recompense my merit? So doth the plowman gaze the wandering star, And only rest contented with the light, That never learned what constellations are Beyond the bent of his unknowing sight. O why should Beauty (custom to obey) To their gross sense apply herself so ill! Would God I were as ignorant as they, When I am made unhappy by my skill Only compelled on this poor good to boast,

Heavens are not kind to them that know them most,

MICHAEL DRAYTON

In pride of wit, when high desire of fame

Gave life and courage to my labouring pen,
And first the sound and virtue of my name
Won grace and credit in the ears of men ;
With those the thronged theatres that press
I in the circuit for the laurel strove,

Where the full praise I freely must confess
In heat of blood a modest mind might move :
With shouts and claps at every little pause,

When the proud round on every side hath rung,
Sadly I sit, unmoved with the applause

As though to me it nothing did belong :

No public glory vainly I pursue,

All that I seek is to eternize you.