CXLVII

    My love is as a fever longing¹ still, For that which longer nurseth the disease； Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill, The uncertain sickly appetite to please. My reason, the physician to my love, Angry that his prescriptions² are not kept, Hath left me, and I desperate now approve Desire is death, which physic did except. Past cure I am, now Reason is past care, And frantic-mad with evermore unrest； My thoughts and my discourse³ as madmen's are, At random⁴ from the truth vainly express'd； For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright, Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.