Verses Design’d by Mrs. A. Behn to Be Sent to a Fair Lady, That Desir’d She Would Absent Herself to Cure Her Love

In vain to Woods and Deserts I retire,
To shun the lovely Charmer I admire,
Where the soft Breezes do but fann my Fire!
In vain in Grotto’s dark unseen I lie,
Love pierces where the Sun could never spy.
No place, no Art his God-head can exclude,
The Dear Distemper reigns in Solitude:
Distance, alas, contributes to my Grief;
No more, of what fond Lovers call, Relief
Than to the wounded Hind does sudden Flight
From the chast Goddesses pursuing Sight:
When in the Heart the fatal Shaft remains,
And darts the Venom through our bleeding Veins.
If I resolve no longer to submit
My self a wretched Conquest to your Wit,
More swift than fleeting Shades, ten thousand Charms
From your bright Eyes that Rebel Thought disarms:
The more I strugl’d, to my Grief I found
My self in Cupid’s Chains more surely bound:
Like Birds in Nets, the more I strive, I find
My self the faster in the Snare confin’d.