John Dowland
IF MY COMPLAINTS COULD PASSION MOVE
If my complaints could passions move
Or make Love see wherein I suffer wrong:
My passions were enough to prove
That my despairs had govern'd me too long
O Love, I live and die in thee
Thy grief in my deep sighs still speaks:
Thy wounds do freshly bleed in me
My heart for thy unkindness breaks:
Yet thou dost hope when I despair
And when I hope, thou mak'st me hope in vain
Thou say'st thou canst my harms repair
Yet for redress, thou let'st me still complain
Can Love be rich, and yet I want?
Is Love my judge, and yet I am condemn'd?
Thou plenty hast, yet me dost scant:
Thou made a God, and yet thy power contemn'd
That I do live, it is thy power:
That I desire it is thy worth:
If Love doth make men's lives too sour
Let me not love, nor live henceforth
Die shall my hopes, but not my faith
That you that of my fall may hearers be
May here despair, which truly saith
I was more true to Love than Love to me