Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503–42). The Poetical Works. 1880.
OdesThat the Power of Love is such he worketh Impossibilities
T
Two contraries in one degree,
And in one point, as seemeth me
To all man’s wit it cannot be;
It is impossible!
Of heat and cold when I complain,
And say that heat doth cause my pain,
When cold doth shake me every vein,
And both at once! I say again,
It is impossible!
That man that hath his heart away,
If life liveth there, as men do say,
That he heartless should last one day
Alive, and not to turn to clay,
It is impossible!
’Twixt life and death, say what who saith,
There liveth no life that draweth breath;
They join so near, and eke I’ faith,
To seek for life by wish of death,
It is impossible!
Yet Love, that all thing doth subdue,
Whose power there may no life eschew,
Hath wrought in me that I may rue
These miracles to be so true,
That are impossible.