The Fair Singer
by Andrew Marvell
To make a final conquest of all me,
Love did compose so sweet an enemy,
In whom both beauties to my death agree,
Joining themselves in fatal harmony;
That while she with her eyes my heart does bind,
She with her voice might captivate my mind.
I could have fled from one but singly fair:
My disentangled soul itself might save,
Breaking the curled trammels of her hair.
But how should I avoid to be her slave,
When subtle art invisibly can wreathe
My fetters of the very air I breathe?
It had been easy fighting in some plain,
Where victory might hang in equal choice,
But all resistance against her is vain,
Who has th' advantage both of eyes and voice;
And all my forces needs must be undone,
She having gained both the wind and sun.
