Contents
-BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD
William Shakespeare (1564–1616). The Oxford Shakespeare: Poems. 1914.
“On a day, alack the day!”
Sonnets to Sundry Notes of Music II
ON a day, alack the day! |
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Love, whose month was ever May, |
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Spied a blossom passing fair, |
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Playing in the wanton air: |
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Through the velvet leaves the wind, |
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All unseen, ’gan passage find; |
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That the lover, sick to death, |
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Wish’d himself the heaven’s breath. |
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‘Air,’ quoth he, ‘thy cheeks may blow; |
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Air, would I might triumph so! |
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But, alas! my hand hath sworn |
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Ne’er to pluck thee from thy thorn: |
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Vow, alack! for youth unmeet: |
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Youth, so apt to pluck a sweet. |
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Thou for whom Jove would swear |
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Juno but an Ethiop were; |
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And deny himself for Jove, |
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Turning mortal for thy love.’ |
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