A Woman's Looks

  A woman’s looks
  Are barbed hooks,
  That catch by art
  The strongest heart,
When yet they spend no breath.
  But let them speak,
  And sighing break
  Forth into tears,
  Their words are spears
That wound our souls to death.
  The rarest wit
  Is made forget,
  And like a child
  Is oft beguiled
With Love’s sweet-seeming bait.
  Love with his rod
  So like a god
  Commands the mind
  We cannot find,
Fair shows hide foul deceit.
  Time, that all things
  In order brings,
  Hath taught me now
  To be more slow
In giving faith to speech:
  Since women’s words
  No truth affords,
  And when they kiss
  They think by this
Us men to overreach.