A Poem For Sunday

by Alice Quinn

Another from Samuel Daniel’s sonnets, To Delia:

Why should I sing in verse, why should I frame

These sad neglected notes for her dear sake?

Why should I offer up unto her name

The sweetest sacrifice my youth can make?

Why should I strive to make her live forever,

That never deigns to give me joy to live?

Why should m’afflicted muse so much endeavor

Such honor unto cruelty to give?

If her defects have purchased her this fame,

What should her virtues do, her smiles, her love?

If this her worst, how should her best inflame?

What passions would her milder favors move?

Favors, I think, would sense quite overcome,

And that makes happy lovers ever dumb.

(Photo by Pavlina Jane)