Chapter I: STOOD amazed, and saw my LICIA shine

Fairer than PHŒBUS in his brightest pride;
Set forth in colours by a hand divine,
Where naught was wanting but a soul to guide.
It was a picture that I could descry,
Yet made with art so as it seemed to live;
Surpassing fair, and yet it had no eye:
Whereof my senses could no reason give.
With that the Painter bid me not to muse,
"Her eyes are shut; but I deserve no blame:
For if she saw, in faith, it could not choose
But that the work had wholly been aflame."
Then burn me, Sweet, with brightness of your eyes;
That, Phœnix-like, from thence I may arise.

SONNET XVI.

"GRANT, fairest kind, a kiss unto thy friend!"
A blush replied; and yet a kiss I had.
It is not heaven that can such nectar send;
Whereat my senses, all amazed, were glad.
This done, She fled as one that was afraid;
And I desired to kiss, by kissing more.
My Love, she frowned; and I my kissing stayed:
Yet wished to kiss her as I did before.
Then as the vine, the propping elm doth clasp,
Loth to depart, till both together die;
So fold me, Sweet; until my latest gasp!
That in thy arms, to death I kissed, may lie.
Thus whilst I live, for kisses I must call:
Still kiss me, Sweet, or kiss me not at all!

SONNET XVII.

AS are the sands, fair LICIA, on the shore;
Or coloured flowers, garlands of the Spring;
Or as the frosts not seen nor felt before;
Or as the fruits that Autumn forth doth bring;
As twinkling stars, the tinsel of the night;
Or as the fish that gallop in the seas;
As airs, each part that still escapes our sight:
So are my Sighs, controllers of my ease.
Yet these are such as needs must have an end,
For things finite, none else hath Nature done:
Only the sighs which from my heart I send
Will never cease, but where they first began.
Accept them, Sweet, as incense due to thee!
For you immortal made them so to be.

SONNET XVIII.