Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. I. Early Poetry: Chaucer to Donne
George Gascoigne (d. 1577)A Strange Passion of a Lover
A
I swim in Heaven, I sink in hell:
I find amends for every miss,
And yet my moan no tongue can tell.
I live and love (what would you more?)
As never lover lived before.
So jest I oft and feel no joy;
Mine eye is builded all on trust,
And yet mistrust breeds mine annoy.
I live and lack, I lack and have;
I have and miss the thing I crave.
Believe me, sweet, my state is such,
One pleasure which I would eschew,
Both slakes my grief and breeds my grutch.
So doth one pain which I would shun,
Renew my joys where grief begun.
In heavy sleep with cares oppressed,
Yet when she spies the pleasant light,
She sends sweet notes from out her breast;
So sing I now because I think
How joys approach when sorrows shrink.
Can watch and sing when other sleep,
And taketh pleasure in her pain,
To wray the woe that makes her weep;
So sing I now for to bewray
The loathsome life I lead alway.
That know’st my mirth but not my moan:
I pray God grant thee deep delight,
To live in joys when I am gone.
I cannot live; it will not be:
I die to think to part from thee.