Thomas Carew

When June Is Past, The Fading Rose

Ask me no more where Jove bestows,

When June is past, the fading rose;

For in your beauty's orient deep

These flowers as in their causes, sleep.

 

Ask me no more whither doth stray

The golden atoms of the day;

For in pure love heaven did prepare

Those powders to enrich your hair.

 

Ask me no more whither doth haste

The nightingale when May is past;

For in your sweet dividing throat

She winters and keeps warm her note.

 

Ask me no more where those stars light

That downwards fall in dead of night;

For in your eyes they sit, and there,

Fixed become as in their sphere.

 

Ask me no more if east or west

The phœnix builds her spicy nest;

For unto you at last she flies,

And in your fragrant bosom dies.