TO A LADY THAT DESIRED ME I WOULD BEAR MY PART WITH HER IN A SONG by RICHARD LOVELACE

THIS is the prettiest motion:
Madam, th' alarums of a drum
That calls your lord, set to your cries,
To mine are sacred symphonies.

What though 'tis said I have a voice;
I know 'tis but that hollow noise
Which, as it through my pipe doth speed,
Bitterns do carol through a reed;
In the same key with monkeys' jigs,
Or dirges of proscribed pigs,
Or the soft serenades above
In calm of night, when cats make love.

Was ever such a consort seen!
Fourscore and fourteen with fourteen!
Yet sooner they 'll agree, one pair,
Than we in our Spring-Winter air;
They may embrace, sigh, kiss the rest:
Our breath knows naught but east and west.
Thus have I heard to children's cries
The fair nurse 'stil such lullabies
That well all said, for what there lay,
The pleasure did the sorrow pay.

Sure there's another way to save
Your fancy, madam; that's to have
('Tis but petitioning kind Fate)
The organs sent to Billingsgate;
Where they to that soft murm'ring choir
Shall reach you all you can admire!
Or do but hear how love-bang Kate
In pantry dark, for fridge of meat,
With edge of steel the square wood shapes,
And @3Dido@1 to it chants or scrapes.
The merry Phaëton o' th' car
You'll vow makes a melodious jar;
Sweeter and sweeter whistleth he
To unanointed axletree;
Such swift notes he and 's wheels do run;
For me, I yield him Phœbus' son.

Say, fair commandress, can it be
You should ordain a mutiny?
For where I howl, all accents fall
As kings' harangues to one and all.

Ulysses' art is now withstood,
You ravish both with sweet and good;
Saint siren, sing, for I dare hear,
But when I ope, oh stop your ear!

Far less be 't emulation
To pass me or in trill or tone,
Like the thin throat of Philomel,
And the smart lute, who should excel,
As if her soft chords should begin,
And strive for sweetness with the pin.

Yet can I music too; but such
As is beyond all voice or touch;
My mind can in fair order chime,
Whilst my true heart still beats the time;
My soul so full of harmony,
That it with all parts can agree:
If you wind up to the highest fret,
It shall descend an eight from it,
And when you shall vouchsafe to fall,
Sixteen above you it shall call,
And yet so disassenting one,
They both shall meet an unison.

Come then, bright cherubin, begin!
My loudest music is within:
Take all notes with your skilful eyes,
Hark if mine do not sympathize!
Sound all my thoughts, and see express'd
The tablature of my large breast,
Then you'll admit that I too can
Music above dead sounds of man;
Such as alone doth bless the spheres,
Not to be reach'd with human ears.

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