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Read Ebook: The Golden Treasury Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language by Palgrave Francis Turner Editor Pearse Alfred Illustrator
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Ebook has 1915 lines and 138872 words, and 39 pages
Under the greenwood tree Who loves to lie with me, And tune his merry note Unto the sweet bird's throat-- Come hither, come hither, come hither! Here shall we see No enemy But winter and rough weather.
Who doth ambition shun And loves to live i' the sun, Seeking the food he eats And pleased with what he gets-- Come hither, come hither, come hither! Here shall he see No enemy But winter and rough weather.
W. SHAKESPEARE.
It was a lover and his lass With a hey, and a ho, and a hey-nonino! That o'er the green cornfield did pass, In the spring time, the only pretty ring time, When birds do sing hey ding a ding: Sweet lovers love the Spring. Between the acres of the rye These pretty country folks would lie: This carol they began that hour, How that life was but a flower: And therefore take the present time With a hey, and a ho, and a hey-nonino! For love is crown?d with the prime In spring time, the only pretty ring time, When birds do sing, hey ding a ding; Sweet lovers love the Spring.
W. SHAKESPEARE.
Absence, hear thou my protestation Against thy strength, Distance, and length: Do what thou canst for alteration: For hearts of truest mettle Absence doth join, and Time doth settle.
Who loves a mistress of such quality, He soon hath found Affection's ground Beyond time, place, and all mortality. To hearts that cannot vary Absence is Presence, Time doth tarry.
ANON.
Being your slave what should I do but tend Upon the hours and times of your desire? I have no precious time at all to spend, Nor services to do, till you require:
Nor dare I chide the world-without-end hour Whilst I, my sovereign, watch the clock for you, Nor think the bitterness of absence sour When you have bid your servant once adieu:
Nor dare I question with my jealous thought Where you may be, or your affairs suppose, But like a sad slave, stay and think of nought Save where you are, how happy you make those;--
So true a fool is love, that in your will, Though you do any thing, he thinks no ill.
W. SHAKESPEARE.
How like a winter hath my absence been From Thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year! What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen, What old December's bareness everywhere!
And yet this time removed was summer's time: The teeming autumn, big with rich increase, Bearing the wanton burden of the prime Like widow'd wombs after their lords' decease:
Yet this abundant issue seem'd to me But hope of orphans, and unfather'd fruit; For summer and his pleasures wait on thee, And, thou away, the very birds are mute;
Or if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer, That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near.
W. SHAKESPEARE.
When in disgrace with Fortune and men's eyes I all alone beweep my outcast state, And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries, And look upon myself, and curse my fate;
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope, Featured like him, like him with friends possest, Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope, With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts my self almost despising, Haply I think on Thee--and then my state, Like to the lark at break of day arising From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remember'd, such wealth brings That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
W. SHAKESPEARE.
O never say that I was false of heart, Though absence seem'd my flame to qualify: As easy might I from my self depart As from my soul which in thy breast doth lie;
That is my home of love, if I have ranged, Like him that travels, I return again, Just to the time, not with the time exchanged, So that myself bring water for my stain.
Never believe, though in my nature reign'd All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood, That it could so preposterously be stain'd To leave for nothing all thy sum of good:
For nothing this wide universe I call, Save thou, my rose, in it thou art my all.
W. SHAKESPEARE.
To me, fair Friend, you never can be old, For as you were when first your eye I eyed Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold Have from the forests shook three summers' pride;
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turn'd, In process of the seasons have I seen, Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burn'd, Since first I saw you fresh which yet are green.
Ah! yet doth beauty, like a dial hand, Steal from his figure, and no pace perceived; So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand, Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceived:
For fear of which, hear this, thou age unbred,-- Ere you were born, was beauty's summer dead.
W. SHAKESPEARE.
Diaphenia like the daffadowndilly, White as the sun, fair as the lily, Heigh ho, how do I love thee! I do love thee as my lambs Are belov?d of their dams; How blest were I if thou would'st prove me.
Diaphenia like the spreading roses, That in thy sweets all sweets encloses, Fair sweet, how do I love thee! I do love thee as each flower Loves the sun's life-giving power; For dead, thy breath to life might move me.
Diaphenia like to all things bless?d When all thy praises are express?d, Dear joy, how do I love thee! As the birds do love the spring, Or the bees their careful king: Then in requite, sweet virgin, love me!
H. CONSTABLE.
Like to the clear in highest sphere Where all imperial glory shines, Of selfsame colour is her hair Whether unfolded, or in twines: Heigh ho, fair Rosaline! Her eyes are sapphires set in snow, Resembling heaven by every wink; The Gods do fear whenas they glow, And I do tremble when I think Heigh ho, would she were mine!
Her cheeks are like the blushing cloud That beautifies Aurora's face, Or like the silver crimson shroud That Phoebus' smiling looks doth grace; Heigh ho, fair Rosaline! Her lips are like two budded roses Whom ranks of lilies neighbour nigh, Within which bounds she balm encloses Apt to entice a deity: Heigh ho, would she were mine!
Her neck like to a stately tower Where Love himself imprison'd lies, To watch for glances every hour From her divine and sacred eyes: Heigh ho, fair Rosaline! Her paps are centres of delight, Her breasts are orbs of heavenly frame, Where Nature moulds the dew of light To feed perfection with the same: Heigh ho, would she were mine!
With orient pearl, with ruby red, With marble white, with sapphire blue, Her body every way is fed, Yet soft in touch and sweet in view: Heigh ho, fair Rosaline! Nature herself her shape admires; The Gods are wounded in her sight; And Love forsakes his heavenly fires And at her eyes his brand doth light: Heigh ho, would she were mine!
Then muse not, Nymphs, though I bemoan The absence of fair Rosaline, Since for a fair there's fairer none, Nor for her virtues so divine: Heigh ho, fair Rosaline! Heigh ho, my heart! would God that she were mine!
T. LODGE.
Beauty sat bathing by a spring Where fairest shades did hide her; The winds blew calm, the birds did sing, The cool streams ran beside her.
My wanton thoughts enticed mine eye To see what was forbidden: But better memory said, fie! So vain desire was chidden:-- Hey nonny nonny O! Hey nonny nonny!
Into a slumber then I fell, When fond imagination Seem?d to see, but could not tell Her feature or her fashion. But ev'n as babes in dreams do smile, And sometimes fall a-weeping, So I awaked as wise this while As when I fell a-sleeping:-- Hey nonny nonny O! Hey nonny nonny!
THE SHEPHERD TONIE.
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; Nor shall death brag thou wanderest in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou growest.
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
W. SHAKESPEARE.
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