William Shakespeare (1564-1616). Take, O Take Those Lips Away. William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. 1907. The Book of Elizabethan Verse

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William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Elizabethan Verse. 1907.

Take, O Take Those Lips Away

By William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

From “Measure for Measure,” Act IV. Scene 1

TAKE, 1 O take those lips away,
That so sweetly were forsworn;
And those eyes, the break of day,
Lights that do mislead the morn!
But my kisses bring again,	5
Bring again;
Seals of love, but seal’d in vain,
Seal’d in vain!

Note 1. This song is quoted in Fletcher’s The Bloody Brother, act v. sc. 2, with the following additional stanza:

	Hide, oh, hide those hills of snow,
	Which thy frozen bosom bears,
	On whose tips the pinks that grow
	Are of those that April wears;
	But first set my poor heart free,
	Bound in those icy chains by thee.

The distinct inferiority of the second stanza to the first leads Mr. Bullen to think that the former was written by Shakespeare and the latter by Fletcher. See also Mr. Swinburne’s note on this song in A Study of Shakespeare, p. 205. [back]

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