John Clare: The Midsummer Cushion :: :: University of Virginia Library

If love be such a wilderness
So full of ills & pains & fate
Where to pass through is sure distress
As wailing doleful drones relate
Why should I to such dangers grow
While there are safer roads to go

But well I wot the pains & ills
That sighing lovers do reveal
Are fashioned most by their own wills
& as they fancy so they feel
If they must mourn 'cause one says “no”
Themselves alone do will it so

A maidens frown is not my fate
My heart for hers I'll freely give
But if for love she offers hate
I'll keep my own & rather live
Fool should I be to pain endure
Which frowns can make & smiles can cure

If I ask one that answers “no”
Am I to end my hopes therebye
She cannot make all wills think so
Then prythee tell me why should I
If she says “no” the next I wis
When met as ready may say “yes”

Let lovers fancy what they list
I'll but admire it for its joys
Nor sigh & grieve as beauty wist
Like restless childern after toys
For why should I in trouble run
Which I by heeding not may shun

That love which youth sets out to seek
As eager as the brook doth run
Is not sown on a painted cheek
Where at fools tamper & are won
But wisdom speeds till these be past
& finds it in the heart at last