Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904.
Parthenophil and ParthenopheSonnet LXXXIII. Dark Night! Black Image of my foul Despair!
Barnabe Barnes (1569?–1609)D
With grievous fancies, cease to vex my soul!
With pain, sore smart, hot fires, cold fears, long care!
(Too much, alas, this ceaseless stone to roll).
My days be spent in penning thy sweet praises!
In pleading to thy beauty, never matched!
In looking on thy face! whose sight amazes
My Sense; and thus my long days be despatched.
But Night (forth from the misty region rising),
Fancies, with Fear, and sad Despair, doth send!
Mine heart, with horror, and vain thoughts agrising.
And thus the fearful tedious nights I spend!
Wishing the noon, to me were silent night;
And shades nocturnal, turnèd to daylight.