Page:Barnfield's Poems.djvu/90



Ere, hold this gioue (this milk-white cheueril gloue)

Not quaintly ouer-wrought with curious knots,

Not deckt with golden spangs, nor siluer spots.

Yet wholsome for thy hand as thou shalt proue.

Ah no; (sweet boy) place this gloue neere thy heart,

Weare it, and lodge it still within thy brest,

So shalt thou make me (most vnhappy,) blest.

So shalt thou rid my paine, and ease my smart:

How can that be (perhaps) thou wilt reply,

A gloue is for the hand not for the heart,

Nor can it well be prou'd by common art,

Nor reasons rule. To this, thus answere I:

If thou from gloue do'st take away the g,

Then gloue is loue: and so I send it thee.

[H] fairest Ganymede, disdaine me not,

Though silly Sheepeheard I, presume to loue thee,

Though my harsh songs and Sonnets cannot moue thee,

Yet to thy beauty is my loue no blot.

Apollo, Ioue, and many Gods beside,

S' daind not the name of cuntry shepheards swains.

Nor want we pleasure, though we take some pains.

We liue contentedly: a thing call'd pride,

Which so corrupts the Court and euery place,

(Each place I meane where learning is neglected.

And yet of late, euen learnings selfe's infected)

I know not what it meanes, in any case:

Wee onely (when Molorchus gins to peepe)

Learne for to folde, and to vnfold our sheepe.