English Poetry I: From Chaucer to Gray.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14. |
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| 82. Like as the Culver, on the Bared Bough |
| | | Edmund Spenser (1552–1599) |
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| LIKE as the culver, on the barèd bough, | |
| Sits mourning for the absence of her mate; | |
| And, in her songs, sends many a wishful vow | |
| For his return that seems to linger late: | |
| So I alone, now left disconsolate, | 5 |
| Mourn to myself the absence of my love; | |
| And, wandering here and there all desolate, | |
| Seek with my plaints to match that mournful dove | |
| Ne joy of aught that under heaven doth hove, | |
| Can comfort me, but her own joyous sight | 10 |
| Whose sweet aspect both God and man can move, | |
| In her unspotted pleasance to delight. | |
| Dark is my day, whiles her fair light I miss, | |
| And dead my life that wants such lively bliss. | |
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