Chapter 18 POEM: SONG

To the tune of a Neapolitan Villanel. All my sense thy sweetness gained; Thy fair hair my heart enchained; My poor reason thy words moved, So that thee, like heaven, I loved. Fa, la, la, leridan, dan, dan, dan, deridan: Dan, dan, dan, deridan, deridan, dei: While to my mind the outside stood, For messenger of inward good. Nor thy sweetness sour is deemed; Thy hair not worth a hair esteemed; Reason hath thy words removed, Finding that but words they proved. Fa, la, la, leridan, dan, dan, dan, deridan, Dan, dan, dan, deridan, deridan, dei: For no fair sign can credit win, If that the substance fail within.

No more in thy sweetness glory, For thy knitting hair be sorry; Use thy words but to bewail thee That no more thy beams avail thee; Dan, dan, Dan, dan, Lay not thy colors more to view, Without the picture be found true. Woe to me, alas, she weepeth! Fool! in me what folly creepeth? Was I to blaspheme enraged, Where my soul I have engaged? Dan, dan, Dan, dan, And wretched I must yield to this; her chasteness is. Sweetness! sweetly pardon folly; Tie me, hair, your captive wholly: Words! O words of heavenly knowledge! Know, my words their faults acknowledge; Dan, dan, Dan, dan, And all my life I will confess, The less I love, I live the less.