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Home  »  The Poetical Works  »  A Vow to love faithfully, howsoever he be rewarded

Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1517–47). The Poetical Works. 1880.

Songs and Sonnets

A Vow to love faithfully, howsoever he be rewarded

SET me whereas the sun doth parch the green,

Or where his beams do not dissolve the ice;

In temperate heat, where he is felt and seen;

In presence prest of people, mad, or wise;

Set me in high, or yet in low degree;

In longest night, or in the shortest day;

In clearest sky, or where clouds thickest be;

In lusty youth, or when my hairs are gray:

Set me in heaven, in earth, or else in hell,

In hill, or dale, or in the foaming flood;

Thrall, or at large, alive whereso I dwell,

Sick, or in health, in evil fame or good,

Her’s will I be; and only with this thought

Content myself, although my chance be nought.