Classic Poem

Farewell, this world! I take my leve for evere.
I am arrested to apere at Goddes face.
O! mightyful God, thu knowest that I had levere
Than all this world to have oone houre space
To make asithe for all my grete trespace.
My hert, alas! is brokene for that sorowe:
Sum are today that shall not be tomorowe.

This life, I see, is but a cheyre feire.
All thinges passene, and so most I, algate.
Today I sat full ryall in a cheire,
Till sotell deth knoked at my gate,
And, onavised, he seid to me, ‘Chek-mate’.
Lo! how sotell he maketh a devors,
And wormes to fede, he hath here leid my cors.

This feble world, so fals and so unstable,
Promoteth his lovers for a little while;
But, at the last, he yeveth hem a bable,
Whene his peinted trouth is torned into gile.
Experience causeth me the trouth to compile,
Thinking this, too late, alas, that I began,
For foly and hope disseiveth many a man.

Farewell! my frendes, the tide abideth no man.
I moste departe hens, and so shall ye.
But in this passage the beste song that I can
Is ‘Requiem Eternam’. I pray God grant it me.
Whan I have ended all mine adversite
Graunte me in Paradise to have a mansion,
That shede his blode for my redempcion.
Beati mortui qui in Domino moriuntur.
Humiliatus sum vermis.