William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Elizabethan Verse. 1907.
The Solitary Shepherd’s SongThomas Lodge (1558–1625)
O
O sacred woods, sweet fields, and rising mountains;
O painted flowers, green herbs, where Flora treads,
Refreshed by wanton winds and wat’ry fountains.
O all you wingèd choristers of wood
That perched aloft, your former pains report,
And straight again recount with pleasant mood
Your pleasant joys in sweet and seemly sort.
O all you creatures, whosoever thrive
On mother earth, in seas, by air, or fire,
More blest are you than I here under sun:
Love dies in me, whenas he doth revive
In you; I perish under beauty’s ire,
Where after storms, winds, frosts, your life is won.