Love-Sonnet I.

O madam, you are of all women true,
Nay virtue’s self, that’s more, for only you
Are that which we imagine to be she;
You, and but you, make virtue here to be;
You, who by binding make us truly free,
Whose only bondman lives in liberty;
You, in which happy word all things are meant
Excepting wickedness and punishment.
You, that are you, which I love more than I,
In whom my soul can rest, yet I not die;
Nay lives, by being there, for that’s his place,
I, but a cabinet that keeps your face
     Or model in my heart, for all that’s I
     May in your picture live, in you must die.