Carol and Cadence :: :: University of Virginia Library

Love may have its root in folly,
As they say, the foolish wise:
Life without it melancholy
Is, the wiser fool replies.
Where's the text without the glose?
When was kissing out of fashion,
Pain because there is in passion
And a thorn to every rose?
Mistletoe still pairs with holly;
Clouds will come in summer skies:
Sager than the Sages Seven
Is the lover who his heaven
Findeth in his lady's eyes.

Love, and you will, for your wages,
Reap repentance soon or late;
So the rhyme runs through the ages,
Since with Adam Eve did mate.
Overhigh might be the price,
If this life should last for ever;
But to-morrow since we sever,
Why from present Paradise
Turn for what they say, the sages?
Kisses at the market-rate
Still I'll buy, whilst life is lent me.
Kiss me, sweet, till I repent me
Or till kissing's out of date.