Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503–42). The Poetical Works. 1880.
OdesThe Lover prayeth that his Ladys Heart might be inflamed with equal Affection
L
Put me to pain,
And yet all is but lost.
I serve in vain,
And am certain,
Of all misliked most.
Both heat and cold
Doth so me hold,
And comber so my mind;
That whom I should
Speak and behold,
It driveth me still behind.
My wits be past,
My life doth waste,
My comfort is exiled;
And I in haste,
Am like to taste
How love hath me beguiled.
Unless that right
May in her sight
Obtain pity and grace;
Why should a wight
Have beauty bright,
If mercy have no place.
Yet I, alas!
Am in such case;
That back I cannot go;
But still forth trace
A patient pace,
And suffer secret woe.
For with the wind
My fired mind
Doth still inflame;
And she unkind
That did me bind,
Doth turn it all to game.
Yet can no pain
Make me refrain,
Nor here and there to range;
I shall retain
Hope to obtain
Her heart that is so strange.
But I require
The painful fire,
That oft doth make me sweat;
For all my ire,
With like desire,
To give her heart a heat.
Then she shall prove
How I her love,
And what I have offer’d;
Which should her move,
For to remove
The pains that I have suffer’d.
And better fee
Than she gave me,
She shall of me attain;
For whereas she
Shewed cruelty,
She shall my heart obtain.