- I never saw that you did painting need,
- And therefore to your fair no painting set;
- I found, or thought I found, you did exceed
- That barren tender of a poet’s debt:
- And therefore have I slept in your report,
- That you yourself, being extant, well might show
- How far a modern quill doth come too short,
- Speaking of worth, what worth in you doth grow.
- This silence for my sin you did impute,
- Which shall be most my glory being dumb;
- For I impair not beauty being mute,
- When others would give life, and bring a tomb.
- There lives more life in one of your fair eyes
- Than both your poets can in praise devise.