Love
O Nectar! O delicious stream!
O ravishing and only pleasure! Where
Shall such another theme
Inspire my tongue with joys or please mine ear!
Abridgement of delights!
And Queen of sights!
O mine of rarities! O Kingdom wide!
O more! O cause of all! O glorious Bride!
O God! O Bride of God! O King!
O soul and crown of everything!
Did not I covet to behold
Some endless monarch, that did always live
In palaces of gold,
Willing all kingdoms, realms, and crowns to give
Unto my soul! Whose love
A spring might prove
Of endless glories, honours, friendships, pleasures,
Joys, praises, beauties and celestial treasures!
Lo, now I see there’€™s such a King,
The fountain-head of everything!
Did my ambition ever dream
Of such a Lord, of such a love! Did I
Expect so sweet a stream
As this at any time! Could any eye
Believe it! Why all power
Is used here;
Joys down from Heaven on my head do shower,
And Jove beyond the fiction doth appear
Once more in golden rain to come
To Danae’€™s pleasing fruitful womb.
His Ganymede! His life! His joy!
Or He comes down to me, or takes me up
That I might be His boy,
And fill, and taste, and give, and drink the cup,
But those (tho’€™ great) are all
Too short and small,
Too weak and feeble pictures to express
The true mysterious depths of Blessedness.
I am His image, and His friend,
His son, bride, glory, temple, end.
