Page 2268 - Shakespeare - Vol. 4

And nuzzling in his flank, the loving swine [1115]
Sheath’d unaware the tusk in his soft groin.

«Had I been tooth’d like him, I must confess,
With kissing him I should have kill’d him first.
But he is dead, and never did he bless

My youth with his; the more am I accurst». [1120]
With this she falleth in the place she stood,
And stains her face with his congealed blood.

She looks upon his lips, and they are pale;
She takes him by the hand, and that is cold.

She whispers in his ears a heavy tale, [1125]
As if they heard the woeful words she told.
She lifts the coffer-lids that close his eyes,

Where lo, two lamps burnt out in darkness lies.

Two glasses where herself herself beheld
A thousand times, and now no more reflect; [1130]
Their virtue lost, wherein they late excell’d,
And every beauty robb’d of his effect.

«Wonder of time», quoth she, «this is my spite,
That thou being dead, the day should yet be light.

«Since thou art dead, lo here I prophesy, [1135]
Sorrow on love hereafter shall attend:
It shall be waited on with jealousy,

Find sweet beginning, but unsavoury end;
Ne’er settled equally, but high or low,
That all love’s pleasure shall not match his woe. [1140]

«It shall be fickle, false and full of fraud;

Bud, and be blasted, in a breathing while;
The bottom poison, and the top o’erstraw’d
With sweets that shall the truest sight beguile;
The strongest body shall it make most weak, [1145]
Strike the wise dumb, and teach the fool to speak.