Cymbeline by William Shakespeare
Act 2 - Scene 2
Imogen’s bedchamber in Cymbeline’s palace:
Imogen : Who's there? my woman Helen?
Lady : Please you, madam
Imogen : What hour is it?
Lady : Almost midnight, madam.
Imogen : I have read three hours then: mine eyes are weak:
[p]Fold down the
leaf where I have left: to bed:
[p]Take not away the taper, leave it
burning;
[p]And if thou canst awake by four o' the clock,
[p]I
prithee, call me. Sleep hath seized me wholly
[p][Exit Lady]
[p]To
your protection I commend me, gods.
[p]From fairies and the tempters
of the night
[p]Guard me, beseech ye.
Iachimo : The crickets sing, and man's o'er-labour'd sense
[p]Repairs itself by
rest. Our Tarquin thus
[p]Did softly press the rushes, ere he
waken'd
[p]The chastity he wounded. Cytherea,
[p]How bravely thou
becomest thy bed, fresh lily,
[p]And whiter than the sheets! That I
might touch!
[p]But kiss; one kiss! Rubies unparagon'd,
[p]How dearly
they do't! 'Tis her breathing that
[p]Perfumes the chamber thus: the
flame o' the taper
[p]Bows toward her, and would under-peep her
lids,
[p]To see the enclosed lights, now canopied
[p]Under these
windows, white and azure laced
[p]With blue of heaven's own tinct. But
my design,
[p]To note the chamber: I will write all down:
[p]Such and
such pictures; there the window; such
[p]The adornment of her bed; the
arras; figures,
[p]Why, such and such; and the contents o' the
story.
[p]Ah, but some natural notes about her body,
[p]Above ten
thousand meaner moveables
[p]Would testify, to enrich mine
inventory.
[p]O sleep, thou ape of death, lie dull upon her!
[p]And be
her sense but as a monument,
[p]Thus in a chapel lying! Come off, come
off:
[p][Taking off her bracelet]
[p]As slippery as the Gordian knot
was hard!
[p]'Tis mine; and this will witness outwardly,
[p]As
strongly as the conscience does within,
[p]To the madding of her lord.
On her left breast
[p]A mole cinque-spotted, like the crimson
drops
[p]I' the bottom of a cowslip: here's a voucher,
[p]Stronger
than ever law could make: this secret
[p]Will force him think I have
pick'd the lock and ta'en
[p]The treasure of her honour. No more. To
what end?
[p]Why should I write this down, that's riveted,
[p]Screw'd
to my memory? She hath been reading late
[p]The tale of Tereus; here
the leaf's turn'd down
[p]Where Philomel gave up. I have enough:
[p]To
the trunk again, and shut the spring of it.
[p]Swift, swift, you
dragons of the night, that dawning
[p]May bare the raven's eye! I
lodge in fear;
[p]Though this a heavenly angel, hell is
here.
[p][Clock strikes]
[p]One, two, three: time, time!
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Next: Act 2 - Scene 3
