“Live with me, and be my love”


LIVE with me, and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
And all the craggy mountains yields.

There will we sit upon the rocks, 5
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, by whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

There will I make thee a bed of roses,
With a thousand fragrant posies, 10
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider’d all with leaves of myrtle.

A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs;
And if these pleasures may thee move, 15
Then live with me and be my love.


LOVE’S ANSWER

If that the world and love were young,
And truth in every shepherd’s tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move,
To live with thee and be thy love.



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“It was a lording’s daughter, the fairest one of three”


IT was a lording’s daughter, the fairest one of three,
That liked of her master as well as well might be,
Till looking on an Englishman, the fair’st that eye could see,
Her fancy fell a-turning.

Long was the combat doubtful that love with love did fight,
To leave the master loveless, or kill the gallant knight:
To put in practice either, alas! it was a spite
Unto the silly damsel.

But one must be refused; more mickle was the pain
That nothing could be used to turn them both to gain,
For of the two the trusty knight was wounded with disdain:
Alas! she could not help it.

Thus art with arms contending was victor of the day,
Which by a gift of learning did bear the maid away;
Then lullaby, the learned man hath got the lady gay;
For now my song is ended.
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joan