MADAM, your beauty and your lovely parts Would scarce admit poetic praise and arts As they are love's most sharp and piercing darts; Though, as again they only wound and kill The more deprav'd affections of our will, You claim a right to commendation still. For as you can unto that height refine All love's delights, as while they do incline Unto no vice they so become divine, We may as well attain your excellence, As without help of any outward sense Would make us grow a pure intelligence. And as a soul, thus being quite abstract, Complies not properly with any act Which from its better being may detract, So through the virtuous habits you infuse, It is enough that we may like and choose, Without presuming yet to take or use. Thus angels in their starry orbs proceed Unto affection, without other need Than that they still on contemplation feed; Though, as they may unto this orb descend, You can, when you would so much lower bend, Give joys beyond what man can comprehend. Do not refuse then, madam, to appear, Since every radiant beam comes from your sphere Can so much more than any else endear, As while through them we do discern each grace, The multiplied lights from every place Will turn, and circle, with their rays, your face. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...AN ISLAND (SAINT HELENA, 1821) by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON INCIDENTS IN THE LIFE OF MY UNCLE ARLY by EDWARD LEAR THE CROPPY BOY: (A BALLAD OF '98) by WILLIAM B. MCBURNEY TO BE CARVED ON A STONE AT THOOR BALLYLEE (1) by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS A CITY PIPER by MORRIS ABEL BEER THE PILGRIM SOUL by MATHILDE BLIND ULTIMATION by MAGDELEN EDEN BOYLE EPIGRAM ON SAID OCCASION by ROBERT BURNS MEDITATIONS FOR EVERY DAY IN PASSION WEEK: THURSDAY by JOHN BYROM |