| |
| AS the sweet sweat of roses in a still, | |
| As that which from chafed musk cat’s pores doth trill, | |
| As the almighty balm of th’ early east, | |
| Such are the sweat drops of my mistress’ breast; | |
| And on her neck her skin such lustre sets, | 5 |
| They seem no sweat drops, but pearl carcanets. 1 | |
| Rank sweaty froth thy mistress’ brow defiles, | |
| Like spermatic issue of ripe menstruous 2 boils, | |
| Or like the scum, which, by need’s lawless law | |
| Enforced, Sanserra’s starvèd men did draw | 10 |
| From parboil’d shoes and boots, and all the rest | |
| Which were with any sovereign fatness blest; | |
| And like vile lying stones 3 in saffron’d tin, | |
| Or warts, or wheals, it hangs upon her skin. | |
| Round as the world’s her head, on every side, | 15 |
| Like to the fatal ball which fell on Ide; | |
| Or that whereof God had such jealousy, | |
| As for the ravishing thereof we die. | |
| Thy head is like a rough-hewn statue of jet, | |
| Where marks for eyes, nose, mouth, are yet scarce set; | 20 |
| Like the first chaos, or flat seeming face | |
| Of Cynthia, when th’ earth’s shadows her embrace. | |
| Like Proserpine’s white beauty-keeping chest, | |
| Or Jove’s best fortune’s urn, is her fair breast. | |
| Thine’s like worm-eaten trunks, clothed in seal’s skin, | 25 |
| Or grave, that’s dust without, and stink within. | |
| And like that slender stalk, at whose end stands | |
| The woodbine quivering, are her arms and hands. | |
| Like rough-bark’d elm-boughs, or the russet skin | |
| Of men late scourged for madness, or for sin, | 30 |
| Like sun-parch’d quarters on the city gate, | |
| Such is thy tann’d skin’s lamentable state; | |
| And like a bunch of ragged carrots stand | |
| The short swollen fingers of thy gouty hand. 4 | |
| Then like the chemic’s masculine equal fire, | 35 |
| Which in the limbec’s warm womb doth inspire | |
| Into th’ earth’s worthless dirt a soul of gold, | |
| Such cherishing heat her best loved part doth hold. | |
| Thine’s like the dread mouth of a fired gun, | |
| Or like hot liquid metals newly run | 40 |
| Into clay moulds, or like to that Ætna, | |
| Where round about the grass is burnt away. | |
| Are not your kisses then as filthy, and more, | |
| As a worm sucking an envenom’d sore? | |
| Doth not thy fearful hand in feeling quake, | 45 |
| As one which gathering flowers still fears a snake? | |
| Is not your last act harsh and violent, | |
| As when a plough a stony ground doth rent? | |
| So kiss good turtles, so devoutly nice | |
| Are priests in handling 5 reverent sacrifice, | 50 |
| And nice in searching wounds the surgeon is, | |
| As we, when we embrace, or touch, or kiss. | |
| Leave her, and I will leave comparing thus, | |
| She and comparisons are odious. | |
