A crown of icicles, that sun nor fire
Could ever melt, and figur'd chaste desire.
A golden star shin'd in her naked breast,
In honour of the queen-light of the east.
In her right hand she held a silver wand,
On whose bright top Peristera did stand,
Who was a nymph, but now transform'd a dove,
And in her life was dear in Venus' love:
And for her sake she ever since that time
Choos'd doves to draw her coach through Heav'n's blue clime:
Her plenteous hair in curled billows swims
On her bright shoulder: her harmonious limbs
Sustain'd no more but a most subtile veil,
That hung on them, as it durst not assail
Their different concord: for the weakest air
Could raise it swelling from her beauties[1] fair;
Nor did it cover, but adumbrate only
Her most heart-piercing parts, that a bless'd eye
Might see, as it did shadow, fearfully,
All that all-love-deserving paradise:
It was as blue as the most freezing skies;
- ↑ beauteous, edit. 1637, a reading more consonant with the genius of Chapman; the adjective fair being, by a figure, taken for her fair limbs.
