- Shakespeare. My flocks feed not,
My ewes breed not,
My rams speed not,
All is amiss:
Love's denying,
250 Faith's defying,
Heart's renying,
Causer of this.
All my merry jigs are quite forgot,
All my lady's love is lost, God wot:
255 Where her faith was firmly fix'd in love,
There a nay is placed without remove.
One silly cross
Wrought all my loss;
O frowning Fortune, cursed, fickle dame!
260 For now I see
Inconstancy
More in women than in men remain.
In black mourn I,
All fears scorn I,
265 Love hath forlorn me,
Living in thrall:
Heart is bleeding,
All help needing,
O cruel speeding,
270 Fraughted with gall.
My shepherd's pipe can sound no deal;
My wether's bell rings doleful knell;
My curtail dog, that wont to have play'd
Plays not at all, but seems afraid;
275 My sighs so deep
Procure to weep,
In howling wise, to see my doleful plight.
How sighs resound
Through heartless ground,
280 Like a thousand vanquish'd men in bloody fight!
Clear wells spring not,
Sweet birds sing not,
Green plants bring not
Forth their dye;
285 Herds stand weeping,
Flocks all sleeping,
Nymphs back peeping
Fearfully:
All our pleasure known to us poor swains,
290 All our merry meetings on the plains,
All our evening sport from us is fled,
All our love is lost, for Love is dead
Farewell, sweet lass,
Thy like ne'er was
295 For a sweet content, the cause of all my moan:
Poor Corydon
Must live alone;
Other help for him I see that there is none.
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