Love

The ninth song

by Sir Aston Cokain 1608–1684

From A Chain of Golden Poems (1658)

Love

O Cupid use thy bow,
Thy deity declare;
Make all fit people know
Thy force that living are.

But shoot aright (good boy)
And mutual fire constrain;
For it is tytanny
To make our love in vain.

Let Matrons peevish be
Whose lookes time hath decaid:
But let no youthful she
From earth decease a Maid.

Let Ethiops froward prove
Whom nature hath made back:
And they thy pleasures love
That no perfections lack.

Make every man love one,
And him his mistress too;
So Hymen shall not moane
For wanting of his due.

The young ones of each sex
Will thereby have content,
And not hereafer vex,
To fast so long a Lent.

MLA

Cokain, Aston. “The ninth song.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/cokain/311/.

Chicago

Cokain, Aston. “The ninth song.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/cokain/311/.

Read this poem with the Codex →

More by Sir Aston Cokain