T. R. Smith, comp. Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse. 1921–22.
Down in a Garden Sat My Dearest Love
Anonymous(From John Cotgrave’s Wit’s Interpreter, 1655) |
DOWN in a garden sat my dearest love, | |
Her skin more soft than down of swan, | |
More tender-hearted than the turtle dove | |
And far more kind than bleeding pelican. | |
I courted her; she rose and blushing said. | 5 |
“Why was I born to live and die a maid?” | |
With that I plucked a pretty marigold, | |
Whose dewy leaves shut up when day is done: | |
“Sweeting,” I said, “arise, look and behold, | |
A pretty riddle I’ll to thee unfold: | 10 |
These leaves shut in as close as cloistered nun, | |
Yet will they open when they see the sun.” | |
“What mean you by this riddle, sir?” she said; | |
“I pray expound it.” Then I thus begun: | |
“Are not men made for maids and maids for men?” | 15 |
With that she changed her colour and grew wan. | |
“Since that this riddle you so well unfold, | |
Be you the sun, I’ll be the marigold.” | |