OF HIS LADY AND HIMSELF by CLEMENT MAROT

IF my love sees me not for one short day,
She tells me that my absence lasted four;
If two days absent, she persists to say
I've been fourteen, nor will abate the score.
But to repress the love that pains me sore,
To shun her sight, is not my reason clear?
Lovers! How different must our loves appear!--
I make her languish when I am not nigh,
She makes me die if I behold her near:
Judge then, who loves the most--or she, or I.

Or e'er she saw me, as my verse she read,
She loved me first, then wished to see my face;
She found me black, with grizzled beard and head,
Yet, for all that, held me in no worse grace.
O gentle heart! O nymph of noble race!
You judged aright, this body worn and pale--
This is not I, it only is my jail.
And in my verse in which you take delight,
Your bright eyes pierced the truth beneath the veil,
And saw me more than when I met your sight.

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

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