Andrew Marvell.

To His Coy Mistress.

Had we but World enoiugh and Time,
This coyness Lady were no crime.
We would sit down, and think which way
To walk, and pass our long Loves Day.
Thou by the Indian Ganges side
Should'st Rubies find: I by the Tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood:
And you should if you please refuse
Till the Conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable Love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy Forehead Gaze.
Two hundred to adore each Breast:
But thirty thousand to the rest.
An Age at least to every part,
And the last Age should show your Heart.
For Lady you deserve this State;
Nor would I love at lower rate.
But at my back I alwaies hear
Times winged Charriot hurring near
And yonder all before us lye
Desarts of vast Eterinty.
Thy Beauty shall no more be found;
Nor, in thy marble Vault , shall sound
My ecchoing Song: thenWorms shall try
That long preserv'd Virginity:
And your quaint Honnor turn to dust:
And into ashes all my Lust.
The Grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.
Now therefore, while the youthful glew
Sits on thy skin like dew,
And while thy willing Soul transpires
At every pores with instant Fires,
Now lets us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our Time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapt pow'r.
Lets roll all our Strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one Ball:
And tear ourPleasures with rough strife,
Through the Iron gates of Life.
Thus, through we cannot make our Sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.