| William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Restoration Verse. 1910. | | | | Song: ‘How prodigious is my fate’ | | By Katherine Philips (‘Orinda’) (1632–1664) |
| | | HOW prodigious is my fate, | |
| Since I can’t determine clearly, | |
| Whether you’ll do more severely | |
| Giving me your love or hate! | |
| For if you with kindness bless me, | 5 |
| Since from you I soon must part; | |
| Fortune will so dispossess me, | |
| That your love will break my heart. | |
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| But since Death all sorrow cures, | |
| Might I choose my way of dying, | 10 |
| I could wish the arrow flying | |
| From Fortune’s quiver, not from yours. | |
| For in the sad unusual story | |
| How my wretched heart was torn, | |
| It will more concern your glory, | 15 |
| I by absence fell than scorn. | | | | |
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