THYRSIS Kala, at length conclude my ling’ring lot: Disdain me not, although I be not fair, Who is an heir of many hundred sheep, Doth beauties keep which never sun can burn, Nor storms do turn: fairness serves oft to wealth, Yet all my health I place in your good will: Which if you will, O do, bestow on me Such as you see; such still you shall me find, Constant and kind, my sheep your food shall breed, Their wool your weed, I will you music yield In flow’ry field; and as the day begins With twenty gins we will the small birds take, And pastimes make, as nature things hath made. But when in shade we meet of myrtle boughs, Then love allows our pleasures to enrich, The thought of which doth pass all worldly pelf. DORUS Lady yourself whom neither name I dare, And titles are but spots to such a worth, Here plaints come forth from dungeon of my mind, The noblest kind rejects not others’ woes. I have no shows of wealth: my wealth is you, {102} My beauties hue your beams, my health your deeds; My mind for weeds your virtue’s livery wears. My food is tears, my tunes lamenting yield, Despair my field, the flowers spirit’s wars: My day new cares, my gins my daily sight, In which do light small birds of thoughts o’erthrown: My pastimes none: time passeth on my fall: Nature made all, but me of dolours made, I find no shade, but where my sun doth burn: No place to turn; without, within it fries: Nor help by life or death, who living dies. THYRSIS But if my Kala thus my suit denies, Which so much reason bears: Let crows pick out mine eyes, which too much saw. If she still hate love’s law, My earthly mould doth melt in wat’ry tears. DORUS My earthly mould doth melt in wat’ry tears, And they again resolve To air of sighs, sighs to the heart fire turn, Which doth to ashes burn. Thus doth my life within itself dissolve. THYRSIS Thus doth my life within itself dissolve That I grow like the beast, Which bears the bit a weaker force doth guide, Yet patient must abide. Such weight it hath, which once is full possess’d. DORUS Such weight it hath, which once is full possess’d, That I become a vision, Which hath in others held his only being, And lives in fancy’s seeing, O wretched state of man in self-division! THYRSIS O wretched state of man in self-division! O well thou say’st! a feeling declaration! Thy tongue hath made, of Cupid’s deep incision. But now hoarse voice, doth fail this occupation, And others long to tell their loves’ condition: Of singing thou hast got the reputation. DORUS Of singing thou hast got the reputation, Good Thyrsis mine, I yield to thy ability; My heart doth seek another estimation. But ah, my Muse, I would thou had’st facility To work my Goddess so by thy invention, On me to cast those eyes where shine nobility: Seen and unknown; heard, but without attention.