Complaint of the Absence of Her Lover being upon the Sea

By Anonymous

16th Century


O HAPPY dames! that may embrace
         The fruit of your delight,
Help to bewail the woful case
         And eke the heavy plight
Of me, that wonted to rejoice
The fortune of my pleasant choice:
Good ladies, help to fill my mourning voice.

In ship, freight with rememberance
         Of thoughts and pleasures past,
He sails that hath in governance
         My life while it will last:
With scalding sighs, for lack of gale,
Furthering his hope, that is his sail,
Toward me, the swete port of his avail.

Alas! how oft in dreams I see
         Those eyes that were my food;
Which sometime so delighted me,
         That yet they do me good:
Wherewith I wake with his return
Whose absent flame did make me burn:
But when I find the lack, Lord! how I mourn!

When other lovers in arms across
         Rejoice their chief delight,
Drowned in tears, to mourn my loss
         I stand the bitter night
In my window where I may see
Before the winds how the clouds flee:
Lo! what a mariner love hath made me!

And in green waves when the salt flood
         Doth rise by rage of wind,
A thousand fancies in that mood
         Assail my restless mind.
Alas! now drencheth my sweet foe,
That with the spoil of my heart did go,
And left me; but alas! why did he so?

And when the seas wax calm again
         To chase fro me annoy,
My doubtful hope doth cause me plain;
         So dread cuts off my joy.
Thus is my wealth mingled with woe
And of each thought a doubt doth grow;
--Now he comes! Will he come? Alas! no, no.

DayPoems Poem No. 43
<a href="http://www.daypoems.net/poems/43.html">Complaint of the Absence of Her Lover being upon the Sea by Anonymous</a>

The DayPoems Poetry Collection, www.daypoems.net
Timothy Bovee, editor

Poets  Poems