Lovely Unkind! could you so Cruel be
To leave the Land ere you took Leave of me?
Explain this mystic Act, and let me know
Whether it doth your Hate, or Kindness show:
Loved you too well my Parting sighs to hear?
Or wanted Strength my kinder Tears to bear?
Or were you Tend'rer yet, and did decline
A solemn Leave, not for your Sake, but mine?
Lest my kind Heart o'ercharged with too much Grief,
Should with my Farewell-sighs breathe out my Life.
Or was it (how the very Thought does fright!)
To show with how much Contempt you could slight?
Or did you love so little, that no Thought
Of poor
Ephelia
to your mind was brought?
No, no, 'twas none of these; I guess thy mind:

Strephon!
thou knew'st I was so fondly kind,
That at the News of Parting, into Tears
I straight had melted, Thousand Am'rous Fears
I had Suggested to my self, and you
In Complaisance must needs have done so too:
You must have told how loath you were to part,
And vowed that tho you went, I kept your Heart;
Omitted nothing tender Love could shew,
From my pale Cheeks have kissed the Pearly Dew;
Spoke all the tender'st things you could devise,
And to the old added new Perjuries;
Vowed Constancy in Absence, and then Swear,
A quick Return should dissipate my Fear:
All of these pleasing Vanities, you knew,
A declared Lover was obliged to do:
But to this trouble you would not be brought,
But stole in silence hence; yet tho you thought
This Tale too long, and troublesome to tell,
You might have grasped my hand, and said Farewell;
At which dire Words, such Consternation would
Have seized my Soul, I senseless should have stood
Till you beyond a Sigh's faint Call had fled;
Nay, till
Tangiere
, you'd near recoverèd:
This way, my Kindness could not tiresome be,
Nor your Neglect would not have troubled me.