A RENOUNCING OF LOVE.

F AREWELL, Love, and all thy laws for
        ever ;
   Thy baited hooks shall tangle me no more.
Senec, and Plato, call me from thy lore,
To perfect wealth, my wit for to endeavour ;
In blind error when I did persever,
Thy sharp repulse, that pricketh aye so sore,
Taught me in trifles that I set no store ;
But scaped forth thence, since, liberty is lever1
Therefore, farewell ! go trouble younger hearts,
And in me claim no more authority :
With idle youth go use thy property,2
And thereon spend thy many brittle darts :
    For, hitherto though I have lost my time,
    Me list no longer rotten boughs to clime.


1 Preferable, of more estimation.
2 Go excercise those qualities which form thy property.


Source:
Yeowell, James, Ed. The Poetical Works of Sir Thomas Wyatt.
London: George Bell and Sons, 1904. 18-19.



Backto the Works of Sir Thomas Wyatt


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Created by Anniina Jokinen on August 25, 2000. Last updated January 20, 2007.