Astrophil and Stella: 86th Sonnet

by Philip Sidney

Alas whence comes this change of lookes? If I
have chang’d desert, let mine owne conscience be
A still felt plague to selfe condemning mee:
Let woe grype on my heart, shame load mine eye:
But if all faith like spotles Ermine lye
Safe in my soule (which onely doth to thee
As his sole object of felicitie
With wings of Love in aire of wonder flie.)
O case your hand, treat not so hard your slave,
In Justice, paines come not till faults do call:
Or if I needs (sweet Judge) must torments have,
Use something else to chasten mee withall,
Than those blest eyes where all my hopes do dwell,
No doome shall make ones Heaven become his Hell.


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