| William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Elizabethan Verse. 1907. | | | | Love Me or Not | | By Thomas Campion (1567–1620) |
| | | LOVE 1 me or not, love her I must or die; | |
| Leave me or not, follow her needs must I. | |
| O that her grace would my wished comforts give! | |
| How rich in her, how happy should I live! | |
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| All my desire, all my delight should be | 5 |
| Her to enjoy, her to unite to me; | |
| Envy should cease, her would I love alone: | |
| Who loves by looks is seldom true to one. | |
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| Could I enchant, and that it lawful were, | |
| Her would I charm softly that none should hear; | 10 |
| But love enforced rarely yields firm content: | |
| So would I love that neither should repent. | |
| | | Note 1. From Campion’s Fourth Book of Airs, 1617. [back] | | |
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