Part 2 — TO THE ROSE: A SONG
Reading edition
Go, happy Rose, and, interwove With other flowers, bind my love. Tell her, too, she must not be Longer flowing, longer free, That so oft fettered me.
Say, if she's fretful, I have bands Of pearl and gold to bind her hands; Tell her, if she struggle still, I have myrtle rods at will For to tame, though not to kill.
Take thou my blessing thus, and go And tell her this,—but do not so!— Lest a handsome anger fly Like a lightning from her eye, And burn thee up, as well as I!
Robert Herrick [1591-1674]