Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904.
DianaThe Seventh Decade. Sonnet VI. Thus long imposed to everlasting plaining
Henry Constable (1562–1613)T
(Divinely constant to the worthiest Fair),
And moved by eternally disdaining,
Aye to persèver in unkind despair:
Because now, Silence, wearily confined
In tedious dying, and a dumb restraint,
Breaks forth in tears from mine unable mind
To ease her passion by a poor complaint:
O do not therefore to thyself suggest!
That I can grieve, to have immured so long
Upon the matter of mine own unrest:
Such grief is not the tenour of my song,
That ’bide so zealously so bad a wrong.
My grief is this. Unless I speak and plain me,
Thou will persèver ever to disdain me.