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.
Marvell - Poems
And learn love before we may.
VI.
So we win of doubtful fate,
Andy if good to us she meant,
We that good shall antedate.
Or, if ill, that ill prevent
vn.
Thus do kingdoms, frustrating
Other titles to their crown.
In the cradle crown their king,
So all foreign claims to drown.
Vlll.
So to make all rivals vain.
Now I crown thee with my love :
Crown me with thy love again.
And we both shall monarchs prove.
Digitized by VjOOQIC
OP MARVELL. 53
TO HIS COY HISTRESa
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
Should'st rubies find : I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the fiood.
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.
Digitized by VjOOQIC
54 THE POEMS
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 youtliful 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-chaped 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.
