Song - 3 - By Sir Philip Sidney

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 colours 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;
The fault I blame 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.