Love’s Diet
- To what a cumbersome unwieldiness
- And burdenous corpulence my love had grown,
- But that I did, to make it less,
- And keep it in proportion,
- Give it a diet, made it feed upon
- That which love worst endures, discretion
-
- Above one sigh a day I allow'd him not,
- Of which my fortune, and my faults had part;
- And if sometimes by stealth he got
- A she sigh from my mistress' heart,
- And thought to feast upon that, I let him see
- 'Twas neither very sound, nor meant to me.
-
- If he wrung from me a tear, I brined it so
- With scorn and shame, that him it nourish'd not;
- If he suck'd hers, I let him know
- 'Twas not a tear which he had got;
- His drink was counterfeit, as was his meat;
- For eyes, which roll towards all, weep not, but sweat.
-
- Whatever he would dictate I writ that,
- But burnt her letters when she writ to me;
- And if that favour made him fat,
- I said, "If any title be
- Convey'd by this, ah ! what doth it avail,
- To be the fortieth name in an entail?"
-
- Thus I reclaim'd my buzzard love, to fly
- At what, and when, and how, and where I choose.
- Now negligent of sports I lie,
- And now, as other falconers use,
- I spring a mistress, swear, write, sigh, and weep;
- And the game kill'd, or lost, go talk or sleep.
From: Songs and Sonnets, 1633.
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