Complaint to My Empty Purse by Geoffrey Chaucer. Upton Sinclair, ed. 1915. The Cry for Justice

Upton Sinclair, ed. (1878–1968).
The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest. 1915.

Complaint to My Empty Purse

By Geoffrey Chaucer

(Early English poet, c.1340–1400)


TO you, my purse, and to none other wight
Complain I, for ye be my lady dear!
I am so sorry, now that ye be light;
For certès, but ye make me heavy cheer,
Me were as lief be laid upon my bier;	5
For which unto your mercy thus I cry:
Be heavy again, or elles might I die!

Now voucheth safe this day, or it be night,
That I of you the blissful sound may hear,
Or see your colour like the sun bright	10
That of yellowness had never a peer.
Ye be my life, ye be my hertes stere,
Queen of comfort and of good company:
Be heavy again, or elles might I die!