Tixall Poetry/Forehead and Cheekes. The First Duell
Forehead and Cheekes.
The First Duell.
Forehead.Let guiltye-minded lovers seekeTheir picture in a blushing cheeke;My virgin thoughts will best agreeWith candid forheads puritye.Cheekes.Let trembling cowards seeke ther faceI' th' pale, wan foreheads looking-glace;My valiant love no meror seekesBut sanguin feelds and rosy cheekes.F.Give me the white, to cloth my senceOf love in native innocence;Since tirant love is understoodeTo paint and cloath it selfe in bloode. C.Give me the red; my Cupid goes,Like other kings, in purple cloths;Let them who sin against his might,A Gods-name pennance doe in white.F.Such fortune fooles as aime at red,By that blind rover may be led;But they had nede, who hit the white,Diana's bow, or Phebus' sight.C.Such fooles as can but aime aright,Soone shoote ther boults, and hit the whiteBut they had neede be Mars his scollers,That aime to beare away the colers.F.While cheekes there colerd rainbow vary,I' th' front the eyes are fixd and tary:Then thats a fading eliment,But this a lasting firmament.C.If eyes are then loves stary bow,That shoote there influence below,Where can we loves reflection seekeBut in the region of the cheeke?F.Beneath the firmament of lovePoore wandring starrs and comets move; The foreheads spheire above may shine,And lovers call it cristalline.C.Pore-blind, and baren Cupids moveThe starles cristallin of love,But fruitfull Venus still apearesI' th' lower orbs, or midle spheres.F.And are not those loves fruitfull spheres,Wherein the milky way apeares?And to his banquet who can sayBut that the forehead leads the way?C.They're onely winter frutes that growUpon the fronts cold Alpe of snow;But where both fruit and biome apeare,Trew spring and paradise is there.F.Ah! can it be a baren browWhere Love himself has held the plow?Or that a fruitles furow, whereHis track and footsteps still apeare?C.Alas! the fronts his comon feild,That often falow lyes untild;But in the cheekes' still dowry close,He pasture finds, and fatter grows. F.Supose loves garland, those who seeke,May find inclosd in every cheeke;Yet love his crowne will onely yeeldeTo win i' th' foreheads open feelde.C.Supose the single front may frowneUnder a French, or single crowne;Yet doble cheekes united raigne,And beare the doble crownes of Spaine.F.Though cheekes there doble garlands prayseThe forehead beares alone the bayse,As in degree above compare,And to the crowne imediate heire:Then let all loyall lovers bow,Not to the cheeke, but to the brow.C.How can the brows degre be good,So paile, and so remote in blood?How can he claime the royall throne,That hath no coler to the crowne,When in the cheekes faire doble posys,French lilys meet with English roses?