To His Coy Mistress E-book

                                      1650 

                              TO HIS COY MISTRESS

                               by Andrew Marvell








Electronically Enhanced Text (c) Copyright 1996, World Library(R)



                  TO HIS COY MISTRESS
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            Had we but world enough, and time,
            This coyness, Lady, were no crime.
            We would sit down and think which way
            To walk and pass our long love's day.
            Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
            Shouldst rubies find: I by the tide
            Of Humber would complain. I would
            Love you ten years before the Flood,
            And you should, if you please, refuse
            Till the conversion of the Jews.
            My vegetable love should grow
            Vaster than empires, and more slow;
            An hundred years should go to praise
            Thine eyes and on thy forehead gaze:
            Two hundred to adore each breast;
            But thirty thousand to the rest;
            An age at least to every part,
            And the last age should show your heart;
            For, Lady, you deserve this state,
            Nor would I love at lower rate.
              But at my back I always hear
                                                                  
            Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
            And yonder all before us lie
            Deserts of vast eternity.
            Thy beauty shall no more be found,
            Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
            My echoing song: then worms shall try
            That long preserved virginity,
            And your quaint honour turn to dust,
            And into ashes all my lust:
            The grave's a fine and private place,
            But none, I think, do there embrace.
              Now therefore, while the youthful hue
            Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
            And while thy willing soul transpires
            At every pore with instant fires,
            Now let us sport us while we may,
            And now, like amorous birds of prey,
            Rather at once our time devour,
            Than languish in his slow-chapt * power.
            Let us roll all our strength and all
                                                                  
            Our sweetness up into one ball,
            And tear our pleasures with rough strife
            Thorough the iron gates of life:
            Thus, though we cannot make our sun
            Stand still, yet we will make him run.
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  * Slowly devouring.
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                            THE END