Katherine Philips (‘Orinda’) (1632–1664)

HOW prodigious is my fate,

Since I can’t determine clearly,

Whether you’ll do more severely

Giving me your love or hate!

For if you with kindness bless me,

Since from you I soon must part;

Fortune will so dispossess me,

That your love will break my heart.

But since Death all sorrow cures,

Might I choose my way of dying,

I could wish the arrow flying

From Fortune’s quiver, not from yours.

For in the sad unusual story

How my wretched heart was torn,

It will more concern your glory,

I by absence fell than scorn.