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Love’s DietLove’s Diet
TO what a cumbersome unwieldiness And burdenous corpulence my love had grown, But that I did, to make it less, And keep it in proportion, Give it a diet, made it feed upon That which love worst endures, discretion
Above one sigh a day I allow`d him not, Of which my fortune, and my faults had part ; And if sometimes by stealth he got A she sigh from my mistress` heart, And thought to feast upon that, I let him see `Twas neither very sound, nor meant to me.
If he wrung from me a tear, I brined it so With scorn and shame, that him it nourish`d not ; If he suck`d hers, I let him know `Twas not a tear which he had got ; His drink was counterfeit, as was his meat ; For eyes, which roll towards all, weep not, but sweat.
Whatever he would dictate I writ that, But burnt her letters when she writ to me ; And if that favour made him fat, I said, "If any title be Convey`d by this, ah ! what doth it avail, To be the fortieth name in an entail?"
Thus I reclaim`d my buzzard love, to fly At what, and when, and how, and where I choose. Now negligent of sports I lie, And now, as other falconers use, I spring a mistress, swear, write, sigh, and weep ; And the game kill`d, or lost, go talk or sleep. |