One day I wrote her name upon the strand / Edmund Spenser

from Amoretti

LXXV

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,
     but came the waves and washèd it away:
     again I wrote it with a second hand,
     but came the tide and made my pains his prey.
Vain man, sayd she, that dost in vain assay,
     a mortal thing so to immortalise,
     for I my selve shall like to this decay,
     and eek my name bee wypèd out lykewise.
Not so (quod I) let baser things devise
     to die in dust, but you shall live by fame:
     my verse your virtues rare shall eternise,
And in the hevens write your glorious name,
     where whenas death shall all the world subdew,
     our love shall live, and later life renew.

~~
Edmund Spenser (1552-1599)
from Amoretti and Epithalamion, 1595

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Edmund Spenser biography
Valentine's Day on The Penny Blog