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XCIX.
The
forward violet thus did I chide:
Sweet thief, whence
didst thou steal thy sweet that smells,
If not from
my love's breath? The purple pride
Which on thy soft
cheek for complexion dwells
In my love's veins thou
hast too grossly dyed.
The lily I condemned for thy
hand,
And buds of marjoram had stol'n thy hair:
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand,
One blushing
shame, another white despair;
A third, nor red nor
white, had stol'n of both
And to his robbery had
annex'd thy breath;
But, for his theft, in pride of
all his growth
A vengeful canker eat him up to death.
More flowers I noted, yet I none could see
But sweet
or colour it had stol'n from thee.
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