Classic Poem

XCVII

Where shall I have at mine own will
Tears to complain? Where shall I fet
Such sighs that I may sigh my fill
And then again my plaints repeat?

For though my plaint shall have none end
My tears cannot suffice my woe.
To moan my harm have I no friend
For Fortune's friend is Mishap's foe.

Comfort, God wot, else have I none
But in the wind to waste my words.
Nought moveth you my deadly moan
But all you turn it into bourds.

I speak not now to move your heart
That you should rue upon my pain.
The sentence given may not revert.
I know such labour were but vain.

But since that I for you, my dear,
Have lost that thing that was my best,
A right small loss it must appear
To leese these words and all the rest.

But though they sparkle in the wind
Yet shall they show your falsed faith
Which is returned unto his kind,
For " like to like" the proverb saith.

Fortune and you did me advance.
Methought I swam and could not drown —
Happiest of all — but my mischance
Did lift me up to throw me down.

And you with your own cruelness
Did set your foot upon my neck,
Me and my welfare to oppress,
Without offence your heart to wreck.

Where are your pleasant words, alas,
Where your faith, your steadfastness?
There is no more but all doth pass
And I am left all comfortless.

But for because it doth you grieve
And also me my wretched life,
Have here my truth: shall naught relieve
But death alone my weary strife.

Therefore, farewell, my life, my death,
My gain, my loss, my salve, my sore.
Farewell also, with you, my breath
For I am gone for evermore.