The faithfull knight now grew in litle space, By hearing her, and by her sisters lore, To such perfection of all heavenly grace, That wretched world … - Edmund Spenser

My Love Is Like To Ice, And I To Fire

My love is like to ice, and I to fire;
How comes it then that this her cold so great
Is not dissolv'd through my so hot desire,
But harder grows the more I her entreat?
Or how comes it that my exceeding heat
Is not delay’d by her heart-frozen cold;
But that I burn much more in boiling sweat,
And feel my flames augmented manifold!
What more miraculous thing may be told,
That fire, which all things melts, should harden ice;
And ice, which is congeal’d with senseless cold,
Should kindle fire by wonderful device!
Such is the power of love in gentle mind,
That it can alter all the course of kind.

His louely words her seemd due recompence
Of all her passed paines: one louing howre
For many yeares of sorrow can dispence:
A dram of sweete is worth a pound of sowre:
Shee has forgott, how many, a woeful stowre
For him she late endurd; she speakes no more
Of past . . .
Before her stands her knight, for whom she toyld so sore.

Sweet Thames, run softly till I end my song.