I LIVE, sweet Love, where as the gentle wind
Murmurs with sport, in midst of thickest boughs;
Where loving woodbine doth the harbour bind,
And chirping birds do echo forth my vows;
Where strongest elm can scarce support the vine,
And sweetest flowers enamelled have the ground;
Where Muses dwell: and yet hereat repine
That on the earth so rare a place was found.
But winds delight: I wish to be content.
I praise the woodbine: but I take no joy.
I moan the birds that music thus have spent.
As for the rest, they breed but mine annoy.
Live thou, fair LICIA, in this place alone:
Then shall I joy, though all of these were gone.