Love
Phillis, Sonnet XXVII
From Elizabethan Sonnet-Cycles, ed. M. F. Crow (1896)
Fair eyes, whilst fearful I your fair admire,
By unexpressèd sweetness that I gain,
My memory of sorrow doth expire,
And falcon-like, I tower joy's heavens amain.
But when your suns in oceans of their glory
Shut up their day-bright shine, I die for thought;
So pass my joys as doth a new-played story,
And one poor sigh breathes all delight to naught.
So to myself I live not, but for you;
For you I live, and you I love, but none else,
Oh then, fair eyes, whose light I live to view,
Or poor forlorn despised to live alone else,
Look sweet, since from the pith of contemplation
Love gathereth life, and living, breedeth passion.
Cite this poem
MLA
Lodge, Thomas. “Phillis, Sonnet XXVII.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/lodge/31/.
Chicago
Lodge, Thomas. “Phillis, Sonnet XXVII.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/lodge/31/.
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