Amid my bale I bathe in bliss,
I swim in Heaven, I sink in hell:
I find amends for every miss,
And yet my moan no tongue can tell.
I live and love (what would you more?)
As never lover lived before.
I laugh sometimes with little lust,
So jest I oft and feel no joy;
Mine eye is builded all on trust,
And yet mistrust breeds mine annoy.
I live and lack, I lack and have;
I have and miss the thing I crave.
* * * * *
Then like the lark that passed the night
In heavy sleep with cares oppressed;
Yet when she spies the pleasant light,
She sends sweet notes from out her breast;
So sing I now because I think
How joys approach when sorrows shrink.
And as fair Philomene again
Can watch and sing when others sleep;
And taketh pleasure in her pain,
To wray the woe that makes her weep;
So sing I now for to bewray
The loathsome life I lead alway.
The which to thee, dear wench, I write,
Thou know'st my mirth but not my moan;
I pray God grant thee deep delight,
To live in joys when I am gone.
I cannot live; it will not be:
I die to think to part from thee.
George Gascoigne.