Modern Love: XIV

What soul would bargain for a cure that brings

Contempt the nobler agony to kill?

Rather let me bear on the bitter ill,

And strike this rusty bosom with new stings!

It seems there is another veering fit

Since on a gold-haired lady's eyeballs pure,

I looked with little prospect of a cure,

The while her mouth's red bow loosed shafts of wit.

Just heaven! can it be true that jealousy

Has decked the woman thus? and does her head

Swim somewhat for possessions forfeited?

Madam, you teach me many things that be.

I open an old book, and there I find

That "Women still may love whom they deceive."

Such love I prize not, madam: by your leave,

The game you play at is not to my mind.