Love bade me welcome. Yet my soul drew back
Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow slack
From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning,
If I lacked any thing.
A guest, I answered, worthy to be here:
Love said, You shall be he.
I the unkind, ungrateful? Ah my dear,
I cannot look on thee.
Love took my hand, and smiling did reply,
Who made the eyes but I?
Truth Lord, but I have marred them: let my shame
Go where it doth deserve.
And know you not, says Love, who bore the blame?
My dear, then I will serve.
You must sit down, says Love, and taste my meat:
So I did sit and eat.
Source: George Herbert and the Seventeenth-Century Religious Poets (W. W. Norton and Company, Inc., 1978)
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Comment: Herbert was a priest in the Church of England, and his poems including this one are rich with Christian imagery. The last two lines refer to the Eucharist. Love is God; "God is love" states 1 John 4 verses 8 & 16. Love is incarnated--in carne (meat)--became literally flesh, and Christians eat this flesh during the Eucharist. More so in the past but still persist today to a lesser degree, there circulated the idea that one has to be worthy, free from sin, in order to receive and consume the Eucharist. Herbert here is likely responding to this idea. (I am not going to quip about theological differences between this and that Christian denominations. In the face of despair I don't think any of us has time for this.)
For explanations of many of the lines and a different version of reading it, go here.