Give me leave (fairest Cynthia) to envy
Thy looking glasse farre happyer then I,
To which thy naked beauties every morne
Thou shewest so freely, while thou dost adorne
Thy richer haire with gems, and neatly decke
With orientall pearle thy whiter necke,
Which take the species of thy naked brest,
So white, I doubt if it can be exprest
By the reflection of the purest glasse,
Which Swans, Snowes, Cerusces doth to surpasse,
As in comparison of it, these may
Rather than white, be termed hoare, or gray:
Besides, all whites but thine may take a spot,
Thine, the first matter of all whites, cannot:
May be thou trusts thy glasses secrecy
With dainties, yet unseene by any eye:
All these thy favours I will well allow
Unto my rivall glasse; but so, that thou
Wilt not permit it justly to reflect
Thy eye upon it selfe: I shall suspect,
And jealous grow, that such reflex may move
Thee (faire Narcissus like) to fall in love
With thine owne beauties shadow: Loves sharpe dart
Shot 'gainst a stone may bound, and wound thy heart:
Which if it should, alas how sure were I
To be past hope, and then past remedy.
This to prevent, may'st thou when thou dost rise,
Vouchsafe to dresse thy beauties in my eyes,
If these shall be to small, may for thy sake,
Hypocondriacke melancholy make
My body all of glasse, all which shall bee
So made, and so constellated by thee,
That as in Christall Mirroirs many a spot
Is by infection of a looke begot:
This glasse of thine if thou but frowne, shall flye
In thousand shivers broken by thine eye:
Since then it hath this sympathy with thee,
Let me not languish in a jealousie,
To thinke this wonder may be brought to passe,
Thy faire lookes may inanimate thy glasse,
And make it my competitor 'tis all one
To give life to a glasse, as make me stone.