Violet, lily, marjoram, rose

Sonnets, [99]. “The forward violet thus did I chide:/ Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells,/ If not from my love’s breath? The purple pride/ Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells/ In my love’s veins thou hast too grossly dy’d./ The lily I condemend for thy hand,/ And buds of marjoram had stol’n thy hair;/ The roses fearfully on thorns did stand,/ One blushing shame, another white despair;/ A third, nor red nor white, had stol’n of both/ and to his robb’ry had annex’d thy breath,/ But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth/ A vengeful canker eat him up to death./ More flowers I noted, yet I none could see./ But sweet or color it had stol’n from thee.”