The Works of Abraham Cowley/Volume 2/The Concealment
THE CONCEALMENT.
No; to what purpose should I speak?No, wretched heart! swell till you break.She cannot love me if she would;And, to say truth, 't were pity that she should.No; to the grave thy sorrows bear;As silent as they will be there:Since that lov'd hand this mortal wound does give,So handsomely the thing contrive,That she may guiltless of it live;So perish, that her killing theeMay a chance-medley, and no murder, be.
'T is nobler much for me, that IBy' her beauty, not her anger, die:This will look justly, and becomeAn execution; that, a martyrdom.The censuring world will ne'er refrainFrom judging men by thunder slain. She must be angry, sure, if I should beSo bold to ask her to make me,By being hers, happier than she!I will not; 't is a milder fateTo fall by her not loving, than her hate.
And yet this death of mine, I fear,Will ominous to her appear;When, sound in every other part,Her sacrifice is found without an heart;For the last tempest of my deathShall sigh out that too with my breath.Then shall the world my noble ruin see,Some pity and some envy me;Then she herself, the mighty she,Shall grace my funerals with this truth;"'T was only Love destroy'd the gentle youth!"