5 IO me now. IO So long as men can breathe or eyes cang XXXIII see, So long lives this and this gives life to Flatter the mountain-tops with sovereign Full many a glorious morning have I seen thee. eye, Kissing with golden face the meadows XXIX green, When, in disgrace with fortune and men's Gilding pale streams with heavenly aleyes, chemy, I all alone beweep my outcast state, Anon permit the basest clouds to ride 5 And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless With ugly rackon his celestial face, cries, And from the forlorn world his visage hide, And look upon myself and curse my fate, Stealing unseen to west with this disgrace: Wishing me like to one more rich in Even so my sun one early morn did shine hope, With all-triumphant splendor on my Featured like him, like him with friends brow; possessed, But out, alack! he was but one hour mine; Desiring this man's art and that man's The region cloud hath masked him from scope, With what I most enjoy contented least; Yet him for this my love no whit disYet in these thoughts myself almost de daineth; spising, Suns of the world may stain, when Haply I think on thee, and then my heaven's sun staineth. state, LXIV Like to the lark at break of day arising From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's When I have seen by Time's fell hand degate; faced For thy sweet love remembered such The rich proud cost of outworn buried age; wealth brings When sometime lofty towers I see downThat then I scorn to change my state razed, with kings. And brass eternal slave to mortal rage; When I have seen the hungry ocean gain 5 XXX Advantage on the kingdom of the shore, And the firm soil win of the watery main, When to the sessions of sweet silent Increasing store with loss and loss with thought I summon up remembrance of things past, When I have seen such interchange of store; I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought, And with old woes new wail my dear time's state, Or state itself confounded to decay; waste: Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow, 5 Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate, For precious friends hid in death's date That Time will come and take my love less night, away. And weep afresh love's long-since can This thought is as a death, which can not choose But weep to have that which it fears to And moan the expensel of many a vanished lose. sight: Then can I grieve at grievances foregone, And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor The sad account of fore-bemoanèd moan, boundless sea, Which I new pay as if not paid before. But sad mortality o'er-sways their power, But if the while I think on thee, dear | How with this rage shall beauty hold a friend, plea, All losses are restored and sorrows end. Whose action is no stronger than a flower? 1 loss. 2 broken masses of flying cloud. 3 of the upper air. IO celled woe, LXV IO LXXIII IO birds sang LXVI O, how shall summer's honey breath hold Lest the wise world should look into out 5 your moan Against the wrackful siege of batt'ring And mock you with me after I am gone. days, When rocks impregnable are not so stout, Nor gates of steel so strong, but Time de That time of year thou mayst in me becays? hold O fearful meditation! where, alack, When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest hang lie hid? Upon those boughs which shake against Or what strong hand can hold his swift the cold, foot back? Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid? O, none, unless this miracle have might, In me thou see'st the twilight of such day 5 That in black ink my love may still shine As after sunset fadeth in the west; bright. Which by and by black night doth take away, Tired with all these, for restful death I Death's second self, that seals up all in rest. cry: As, to behold desert a beggar born, In me thou see'st the glowing of such And needy nothing trimmed in jollity, fire And purest faith unhappily forsworn, That on the ashes of his youth doth lie, 10 And gilded honor shamefully misplaced, 5 As the death-bed whereon it must exAnd maiden virtue rudely strumpeted, pire, And right perfection wrongfully disgraced, Consumed with that which it was nourAnd strength by limping sway disabled, ished by. And art made tongue-tied by authority, This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy And folly, doctor-like, controlling skill, 10 love more strong, And simple truth miscalled simplicity, To love that well which thou must leave And captive good attending captain ill. ere long Tired with all these, from these would I XCVIII From you have I been absent in the spring, Save that, to die, I leave my love alone. When proud-pied? April dressed in all his trim LXXI Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing, No longer mourn for me when I am dead That heavy Saturn laughed and leaped Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell with him. Give warning to the world that I am fled Yet nor the lays of birds nor the sweet From this vile world, with vilest worms to smell 5 dwell: Of different flowers in odor and in hue Nay, if you read this line, remember not 5 Could make me any summer's story tell, The hand that writ it; for I love you so Or from their proud lap pluck them where That I in your sweet thoughts would be they grew; forgot Nor did I wonder at the lily's white, If thinking on me then should make you Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose; They were but sweet, but figures of deO, if, I say, you look upon this verse light, When I perhaps compounded am with Drawn after you, you pattern of all those. Yet seemed it winter still, and, you Do not so much as my poor name re- away, hearse, As with your shadow, I with these did But let your love even with my life decay, play. I folly. be gone, woe. II clay, IO gorgeously variegated. 2 IO CVI Then, soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss, When in the chronicle of wasted time I see descriptions of the fairest wights, And let that pine to aggravate thy store;10 And beauty making beautiful old rhyme Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross; In praise of ladies dead and lovely knights; Within be fed, without be rich no more: Then, in the blazon of sweet beauty's So shalt thou feed on Death, that feeds best, on men, 5 Of hand, of foot, of lip, of eye, of brow, And Death once dead, there's no more I see their antique pen would have ex dying then. pressed Even such a beauty as you master now. ELIZABETHAN SONG WRITERS So all their praises are but prophecies Of this our time, all you prefiguring; ANONYMOUS And, for they looked but with divining eyes, BACK AND SIDE GO BARE, GO They had not skill enough your worth to BARE sing: For we, which now behold these present Back and side go bare, go bare, days, Both hand and foot go cold; Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues But, belly, God send thee good ale to praise. enough, Whether it be new or old. I cannot eat but little meat, 5 Admit impediments. Love is not love My stomach is not good; Which alters when it alteration finds, But sure I think that I can drink With him that wears a hood. Or bends with the remover to remove: 0, no! it is an ever-fixed mark Though I go bare, take ye no care, 5 That looks on tempests and is never I am nothing a-cold; shaken; I stuff my skin so full within Of jolly good ale and old. Back and side, etc. I love no roast but a nutbrown toast, and cheeks And a crab' laid in the fire; 15 Within his bending sickle's compass come; A little bread shall do me stead, Much bread I not desire. Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, No frost nor snow, no wind, I trow, Can hurt me if it would, I am so wrapt and throughly lapt Of jolly good ale and old. Back and side, etc. IO II 20 25 CXLVI And Tib my wife, that as her life Poor soul, the center of my sinful earth, Loveth well good ale to seek, Thrall to these rebel powers that thee Full oft drinks she, till ye may see array, The tears run down her cheek; Why dost thou pine within and suffer Then doth she trowl? to me the bowl dearth, Even as a maltworm should, Painting thy outward walls so costly gay? And saith, “Sweetheart, I have take my Why so large cost, having so short a lease, 5 part Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? Of this jolly good ale and old.” Shall worms, inheritors of this excess, 30 Back and side, etc. Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end? 1 apple. 3 a tippler. pass. 35 40 40 Now let them drink till they nod and I laugh not at another's loss; I grudge not at another's pain; My state at one doth still remain: 35 And all poor souls that have scoured' bowls, I loathe not life, nor dread my end. Or have them lustily trowled, God save the lives of them and their wives, Some weigh their pleasure by their lust, Whether they be young or old. Their wisdom by their rage of will; Their treasure is their only trust; A cloaked craft their store of skill: Is to maintain a quiet mind. My wealth is health and perfect ease; My conscience clear my chief defence; SIR EDWARD DYER (15507-1607) I neither seek by bribes to please, 45 Nor by deceit to breed offence: Would all did so as well as I! SIR PHILIP SIDNEY (1564–1686) LOVE IS DEAD 5 Ring out your bells, let mourning shows Yet still my mind forbids to crave. be spread; For Love is dead: No princely pomp, no wealthy store, All Love is dead, infected With plague of deep disdain: Worth, as nought worth, rejected, 5 And Faith fair scorn doth gain. To none of these I yield as thrall: From so ungrateful fancy, For why? My mind doth serve for all. From such a female franzie,2 I see how plenty (surfeits] oft, From them that use men thus, And hasty climbers soon do fall; Good Lord, deliver us! I see that those which are aloft 15 Mishap doth threaten most of all; Weep, neighbors, weep; do you not hear it They get with toil, they keep with fear: said Such cares my mind could never bear. That Love is dead? Content to live, this is my stay; His death-bed, peacock's folly; His winding-sheet is shame; His will, false-seeming holy; 15 His sole exec'tor, blame. From so ungrateful fancy, Content with that my mind doth bring. From such a female franzie, From them that use men thus, Some have too much, yet still do crave;25 Good Lord, deliver us! I little have, and seek no more. They are but poor, though much they Let dirge be sung, and trentals rightly read, have, For Love is dead; Sir Wrong his tomb ordaineth 30 25 I emptied. 2 frenzy. IO IO 20 20 GEORGE PEELE (1568?-1697?) "Her eyes were once his dart.” From so ungrateful fancy, CUPID'S CURSE 30 IO JOHN LYLY (16642-1606) CUPID AND CAMPASPE ENONE. Fair and fair, and twice so fair, As fair as any may be; green, A love for any lady. As fair as any may be; And for no other lady. As fresh as bin2 the flowers in May, My merry, merry roundelay, new, Thy love is fair, etc. sing, Amen to Cupid's curse,- 5 20 Cupid and my Campaspe played IO SPRING'S WELCOME ROBERT GREENE (1660?-1692) What bird so sings, yet so does wail? O 'tis the ravished nightingale. SWEET ARE THE THOUGHTS "Jug, jug, jug, jug, tereu," she cries, And still her woes at midnight rise. Sweet are the thoughts that savor of conBrave prick-song! who is't now we hear? 5 tent; None but the lark so shrill and clear; The quiet mind is richer than a crown; Now at heaven's gates she claps her wings, Sweet are the nights in careless slumber The morn not waking till she sings. spent; Hark, hark, with what a pretty throat The poor estate scorns fortune's angry Poor robin redbreast tunes his note; frown: Hark how the jolly cuckoos sing, Şuch sweet content, such minds, such Cuckoo, to welcome in the spring; sleep, such bliss, 5 Cuckoo, to welcome in the spring! Beggars enjoy, when princes oft do miss. 1 wagered. 3 Both together. • knows how to do. 7 are. |