I am currently reading Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, for the first time ever. By reading, I mean that I sit in the park on a blanket, taking in the sun, and reading aloud to the birds, bees, and passersby walking their dogs. Thankfully it's a big park (Sherwood Gardens).
Anyway, very early in the play, I come upon the brief mono by Olivia, after having just met Cesario (Violet disguised as a young lad) for the first time. She has fallen immediately and irretrievably in love:
What is your parentage?
'Above my fortunes, yet my state is well; I am a gentleman.' I'll be sworn thou art;
Thy tongue, thy face, thy limbs, actions, and spirit
Do give thee fivefold blazon. Not too fast! Soft,
soft!
Unless the master were the man. How now?
Even so quickly may one catch the plague?
Methinks I feel this youth’s perfections
With an invisible and subtle stealth
To creep in at mine eyes. Well, let it be.—
www.sherwoodgardens.org
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