dots-menu
×
Home  »  library  »  poem  »  How the Lover Perisheth in his Delight as the Fly in the Fire

C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.

How the Lover Perisheth in his Delight as the Fly in the Fire

By Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503–1542)

SOME fowels there be who have so perfect sight,

Against the sun their eyes for to defend;

And some, because the light doth them offend,

Never appear but in the dark or night;

Others rejoice to see the fire so bright,

And ween to play in it, as they pretend,

But find contrary of it, that they intend.

Alas! of that sort may I be by right;

For to withstand her look I am not able:

Yet can I not hide me in no dark place;

So followeth me remembrance of that face,

That with my teary eyen, swoln and unstable,

My destiny to behold her doth me lead;

And yet I know I run into the glead.