[Dear to my soul,...] by Henry Constable

Dear to my soul, then leave me not forsaken!
     Fly not! my heart within thy bosom sleepeth:
Even from my self and sense I have betaken
     Me unto thee for whom my spirit weepeth;
And on the shore of that salt teary sea,
     Couched in a bed of unseen seeming pleasure,
Where in imaginary thoughts thy fair self lay,
     But being waked, robbed of my life’s best treasure,
I call the heavens, air, earth, and seas to hear
     My love, my truth, and black disdained estate;
Beating the rocks with bellowings of despair,
     Which still with plaints my words reverberate;
          Sighing, ‘Alas, what shall become of me?’
          Whilst Echo cries, ‘What shall become of me?’


Everyman's Book of English Love Poems, ed. by John Hadfield (London, Melbourne, Toronto: J M Dent & Sons, 1980), 54.