Thomas Carew

Persuasions to Enjoy

If the quick spirits in your eye

Now languish and anon must die;

If every sweet and every grace

Must fly from that forsaken face;

Then, Celia, let us reap our joys

Ere Time such goodly fruit destroys.

 

Or if that golden fleece must grow

For ever free from agèd snow;

If those bright suns must know no shade,

Nor your fresh beauties ever fade;

Then fear not, Celia, to bestow

What, still being gather'd, still must grow.

 

Thus either Time his sickle brings

In vain, or else in vain his wings.