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ZEPHERIA
Ogni di viene la sera.
Mysus et Hæmonia juvenis qui cus-
pide vulnus senserat, hac ipsa
cuspide sensit opem.
AT LONDON:
Printed by the Widow ORWIN, for N. L. and
JOHN BUSBY.
1594.
Alii veri figlioli delle Muse.
YE modern Laureates, famoused for your writ, | |
| Who for your pregnance may in Delos dwell! | |
| On your sweet lines, Eternity doth sit; | |
| Their brows ennobling with applause and laurel! | |
| Triumph and Honour aye invest your writ! | 5 |
| Ye fet[ch] your pens from wing of singing swan, | |
| When (sweetly warbling to herself) she floats | |
| Adown Meander streams; and like to organ, | |
| Imparts, into her quills, melodious notes! | |
| Ye, from the Father of delicious phrases, | 10 |
| Borrow such Hymns as make your Mistress live | |
| When Time is dead! Nay, HERMES tunes the praises | |
| Which ye, in Sonnets, to your Mistress give! | |
| Report, throughout our Western Isle doth ring, | |
| The sweet tuned accents of your Delian sonnetry, | 15 |
| Which to Apollo’s violin, ye sing! | |
| O, then, your high strains drown his melody! | |
| From forth dead sleep of everlasting dark; | |
| Fame, with her trump’s shrill summon, hath awaked | |
| The Roman NASO, and the Tuscan PETRARCH, | 20 |
| Your spirit-ravishing lines to wonder at! | |
| O theme befitting high-Mused ASTROPHIL! | |
| He, to your silvery Songs, lent sweetest touch! | |
| Your Songs, the immortal spirit of your quill! | |
| O, pardon! for my artless pen too much | 25 |
| Doth dim your glories, through his infant skill. | |
| Though may I not, with you, the spoils divide | |
| (Ye sacred Offspring of MNEMOSYNE!) | |
| Of endless praise, which have your pens achieved | |
| (Your pens the Trumps to Immortality!); | 30 |
| Yet be it lawful, that like maims I bide! | |
| Like brunts and scars, in your Love’s warfare! | |
| And here, though in my homespun Verse, of them declare! | |
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