University of Virginia Library

The louer refused lamenteth his estate.

I lent my loue to losse and gaged my life in vaine,
If hate for loue and death for life of louers be the gaine,
And curse I may by course the place eke time and howre
That nature first in me did forme to be a liues creature
Sith that I must absent my selfe so secretly
In place desert where neuer man my secretes shall discrye
In dolling of my dayes among the beastes so brute
Who with their tonges may not bewray the secretes of my sute
Nor I in like to them may once to moue my minde
But gase on them and they on me as bestes are wont of kinde
Thus ranging as refusde to reche some place of rest,
All ruff of heare, my nayles vnnocht, as to such semeth best.
That wander by theyr wittes, deformed so to be,
That men may say, such one may curse the tyme he first gan see
The beauty of her face, her shape in such degree,
As god himself may not discerne, one place mended to be.
Nor place it in lyke place, my fansy for to please,
Who would become a heardmans hyre one howre to haue of ease.
Wherby I might restore, to me some stedfastnes,
That haue mo thoughts hept in my head then life may lōg disges.
As oft to throw me downe vpon the earth so cold,
Wheras with teares most rufully, my sorowes do vnfold.
And in beholding them, I chiefly call to mynd,
What woman could find in her heart, such bondage for to bynd.
Then rashly furth I yede, to cast me from that care,
Lyke as the byrd for foode doth flye, and lighteth in the snare.
From whence I may not meue, vntil my race be roon,
So trayned is my truth through her, yt thinkes my life well woon.
Thus tosse I too and fro, in hope to haue reliefe,
But in the fine I fynd not so, it doubleth but my grief.
Wherfore I will my want, a warning for to be,
Unto all men, wishing that they, a myrrour make of me.