I must confess, when I did part from you,
I could not force an artificial dew
Upon my cheeks, nor with a gilded phrase
Express how many hundred several ways
My heart was tortur'd, nor, with arms across,5
In discontented garbs set forth my loss:
Such loud expressions many times do come
From lightest hearts: great griefs are always dumb.
The shallow rivers roar, the deep are still;
Numbers of painted words may shew much skill:10
But little anguish and a cloudy face
Is oft put on, to serve both time and place:
The blazing wood may to the eye seem great;
But 'tis the fire rak'd up that has the heat,
And keeps it long. True sorrow's like to wine:15
That which is good does never need a sign.
My eyes were channels far too small to be
Conveyers of such floods of misery:
And so pray think; or if you'd entertain
A thought more charitable, suppose some strain20
Of sad repentance had, not long before,
Quite emptied for my sins that watery store:
So shall you him oblige that still will be
Your servant to his best ability.