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Three songs about love : to texts by early English poets

Song Cycle by Samuel Hans Adler (b. 1928)

1. Go, lovely rose  [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English 
Go, lovely Rose! --
Tell her, that wastes her time and me,
  That now she knows,
When I resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.

Tell her that's young,
  And shuns to have her graces spied
That hadst thou sprung
  In deserts, where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.

Small is the worth
  Of beauty from the light retir'd;
Bid her come forth,
  Suffer herself to be [desir'd]1,
And not blush so to be admir'd.

Then die! -- that she
  The common fate of all things rare
May read in thee:
  How small a part of time they share
That are so wondrous sweet and fair!

Yet though thou fade,
From thy dead leaves let fragrance rise;
And teach the maid
That goodness time's rude hand defies;
That virtue lives when beauty dies.

Text Authorship:

  • by Edmund Waller (1608 - 1687)
  • by Henry Kirke White (1785 - 1806)

See other settings of this text.

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

  • SPA Spanish (Español) (José Miguel Llata) , copyright © 2020, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

View original text (without footnotes)
See also Ezra Pound's Envoi.

1 Attwood: "admir'd" [possibly a mistake]

Researcher for this page: Ted Perry

2. A ditto
 (Sung text)

Language: English 
My true Love hath my heart and I have his.
By just exchange, one for the other given:
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss;
There never was a better bargain driven:
My true Love hath my heart and I have his.
His heart in me keeps him and me in one;
My heart in him his thoughts and senses guide:
He loves my heart, for once it was his own;
I cherish his because in me it bides:
My true Love hath my heart and I have his.
 ... 

Text Authorship:

  • by Philip Sidney, Sir (1554 - 1586), no title, appears in Arcadia

See other settings of this text.

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

  • GER German (Deutsch) (Richard Flatter) , "Der Handel", appears in Die Fähre, Englische Lyrik aus fünf Jahrhunderten, first published 1936

Parodied in Archibald Stodart-Walker's My true friend hath my hat.

Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Ted Perry

3. Song
 (Sung text)

Language: English 
When lovely woman stoops to folly,
  And finds too late that men betray,
What charm can soothe her melancholy,
  What art can wash her guilt away?

The only art her guilt to cover,
  To hide her shame from every eye,
To give repentance to her lover,
  And wring his bosom — is to die.

Text Authorship:

  • by Oliver Goldsmith (1730 - 1774), no title, appears in The Vicar of Wakefield: A Tale

Based on:

  • a text in French (Français) by Anonymous/Unidentified Artist , first published 1719
    • Go to the text page.

Go to the general single-text view

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
Total word count: 285
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