VII

    Love, in a humour, played the prodigal,
    And bade my senses to a solemn feast;
    Yet more to grace the company withal,
    Invites my heart to be the chiefest guest. 
      No other drink would serve this glutton’s turn,
    But precious tears distilling from mine eyne,
    Which with my sighs this epicure doth burn,
    Quaffing carouses in this costly wine;
      Where, in his cups, o’ercome with foul excess,
    Straightways he plays a swaggering ruffian’s part,
    And at the banquet in his drunkenness,
    Slew his dear friend, my kind and truest heart. 
      A gentle warning, friends, thus may you see,
      What ’tis to keep a drunkard company!

    VIII

    There’s nothing grieves me but that age should haste,
    That in my days I may not see thee old;
    That where those two clear sparkling eyes are placed,
    Only two loopholes that I might behold;
      That lovely arched ivory-polished brow
    Defaced with wrinkles, that I might but see;
    Thy dainty hair, so curled and crisped now,
    Like grizzled moss upon some aged tree;
      Thy cheek now flush with roses, sunk and lean;
    Thy lips, with age as any wafer thin! 
    Thy pearly teeth out of thy head so clean,
    That when thou feed’st thy nose shall touch thy chin! 
      These lines that now thou scornst, which should delight thee,
      Then would I make thee read but to despite thee.

    IX

    As other men, so I myself do muse
    Why in this sort I wrest invention so,
    And why these giddy metaphors I use,
    Leaving the path the greater part do go. 
      I will resolve you.  I’m a lunatic;
    And ever this in madmen you shall find,
    What they last thought of when the brain grew sick,
    In most distraction they keep that in mind. 
      Thus talking idly in this bedlam fit,
    Reason and I, you must conceive, are twain;
    ’Tis nine years now since first I lost my wit. 
    Bear with me then though troubled be my brain. 
      With diet and correction men distraught,
      Not too far past, may to their wits be brought.

    X

    To nothing fitter can I thee compare
    Than to the son of some rich penny-father,
    Who having now brought on his end with care,
    Leaves to his son all he had heaped together. 
      This new rich novice, lavish of his chest,
    To one man gives, doth on another spend;
    Then here he riots; yet amongst the rest,
    Haps to lend some to one true honest friend. 
      Thy gifts thou in obscurity dost waste: 
    False friends, thy kindness born but to deceive thee;
    Thy love that is on the unworthy placed;
    Time hath thy beauty which with age will leave thee. 
      Only that little which to me was lent,
      I give thee back when all the rest is spent.