| |
| WHEN Summer took in hand the winter to assail, | |
| With force of might, and virtue great, his stormy blasts to quail: | |
| And when he clothed fair the earth about with green, | |
| And every tree new garmented, that pleasure was to seen: | |
| Mine heart ’gan new revive, and changed blood did stir, | 5 |
| Me to withdraw my winter woes, that kept within my dore. 1 | |
| ‘Abroad,’ quoth my desire, ‘assay to set thy foot; | |
| Where thou shalt find the savour sweet; for sprung is every root. | |
| And to thy health, if thou were sick in any case, | |
| Nothing more good than in the spring the air to feel a space. | 10 |
| There shalt thou hear and see all kinds of birds y-wrought, | |
| Well tune their voice with warble small, as nature hath them taught.’ | |
| Thus pricked me my lust the sluggish house to leave, | |
| And for my health I thought it best such counsel to receive. | |
| So on a morrow forth, unwist of any wight, | 15 |
| I went to prove how well it would my heavy burden light. | |
| And when I felt the air so pleasant round about, | |
| Lord! to myself how glad I was that I had gotten out. | |
| There might I see how Ver 2 had every blossom hent, 3 | |
| And eke the new betrothed birds, y-coupled how they went; | 20 |
| And in their songs, methought, they thanked Nature much, | |
| That by her license all that year to love, their hap was such, | |
| Right as they could devise to choose them feres 4 throughout: | |
| With much rejoicing to their Lord, thus flew they all about. | |
| Which when I ’gan resolve, and in my head conceive, | 25 |
| What pleasant life, what heaps of joy, these little birds receive; | |
| And saw in what estate I, weary man, was wrought, | |
| By want of that, they had at will, and I reject at nought; | |
| Lord! how I gan in wrath unwisely me demean! | |
| I cursed Love, and him defied; I thought to turn the stream. | 30 |
| But when I well beheld, he had me under awe, | |
| I asked mercy for my fault, that so transgrest his law: | |
| Thou blinded God,’ quoth I, ‘forgive me this offence, | |
| Unwittingly I went about, to malice thy pretence.’ | |
| Wherewith he gave a beck, and thus methought he swore: | 35 |
| ‘Thy sorrow ought suffice to purge thy fault, if it were more.’ | |
| The virtue of which sound mine heart did so revive. | |
| That I, methought, was made as whole as any man alive. | |
| But here I may perceive mine error, all and some, | |
| For that I thought that so it was; yet was it still undone; | 40 |
| And all that was no more but mine expressed mind, | |
| That fain would have some good relief, of Cupid well assign’d. | |
| I turned home forthwith, and might perceive it well, | |
| That he aggrieved was right sore with me for my rebel. | |
| My harms have ever since increased more and more, | 45 |
| And I remain, without his help, undone for ever more. | |
| A mirror let me be unto ye lovers all; | |
| Strive not with love; for if ye do, it will ye thus befall. | |
