Love
Where most my thoughts, there least mine eye is striking
From Lyrics from the Song-Books of the Elizabethan Age, ed. A. H. Bullen (London: Nimmo, 1891)
Where most my thoughts, there least mine eye is striking;
Where least I come there most my heart abideth;
Where most I love I never show my liking;
From what my mind doth hold my body slideth;
I show least care where most my care dependeth;
A coy regard where most my soul attendeth.
Despiteful thus unto myself I languish,
And in disdain myself from joy I banish.
These secret thoughts enwrap me so in anguish
That life, I hope, will soon from body vanish,
And to some rest will quickly be conveyed
That on no joy, while so I lived, hath stayed.
Codex Note
From John Wilbye's Second Set of Madrigals, 1609.
Cite this poem
MLA
Anonymous (Elizabethan songs). “Where most my thoughts, there least mine eye is striking.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/anonymous-elizabethan-songs/176/.
Chicago
Anonymous (Elizabethan songs). “Where most my thoughts, there least mine eye is striking.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/anonymous-elizabethan-songs/176/.
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