Classic Poem

XXXIV

The flaming sighs that boil within my breast
Sometime break forth and they can well declare
The heart's unrest and how that it doth fare,
The pain thereof, the grief, and all the rest.
The watered eyes from whence the tears do fall
Do feel some force or else they would be dry.
The wasted flesh of colour dead can try
And something tell what sweetness is in gall.
And he that list to see and to discern
How care can force within a wearied mind,
Come he to me: I am that place assigned.
But for all this no force, it doth no harm.
The wound, alas, hap in some other place
From whence no tool away the scar can rase.

But you that of such like have had your part
Can best be judge. Wherefore, my friend so dear,
I thought it good my state should now appear
To you and that there is no great desert.
And whereas you, in weighty matters great,
Of fortune saw the shadow that you know,
For trifling things I now am stricken so
That, though I feel my heart doth wound and beat,
I sit alone, save on the second day
My fever comes with whom I spend the time
In burning heat while that she list assign.
And who hath health and liberty alway,
Let him thank God and let him not provoke
To have the like of this my painful stroke.