Love

Fidessa: Sonnet 38

by Bartholomew Griffin fl. 1596

From Elizabethan Sonnet-Cycles, ed. M. F. Crow (1897)

Love

Was never eye did see my mistress' face,
Was never ear did hear Fidessa's tongue,
Was never mind that once did mind her grace,
That ever thought the travail to be long.
When her I see, no creature I behold,
So plainly say these advocates of love,
That now do fear and now to speak are bold,
Trembling apace when they resolve to prove.
These strange effects do show a hidden power,
A majesty all base attempts reproving,
That glads or daunts as she doth laugh or lower;
Surely some goddess harbours in their moving
Who thus my Muse from base attempts hath raised,
Whom thus my Muse beyond compare hath praised.

MLA

Griffin, Bartholomew. “Fidessa: Sonnet 38.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/griffin_b/37/.

Chicago

Griffin, Bartholomew. “Fidessa: Sonnet 38.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/griffin_b/37/.

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