Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford. If Women Could Be Fair And Yet Not Fond.

EDWARD VERE, EARL OF OX-
FORD, in William Byrd's
Psalms, Sonnets, and Songs
of Sadness and Piety. 1588.

IF WOMEN COULD BE FAIR AND YET
NOT FOND.
IF women could be fair and yet not fond,
Or that their love were firm, not fickle still,
I would not marvel that they make men bond
By service long to purchase their good will ;
But when I see how frail those creatures are,
I laugh that men forget themselves so far.

To mark the choice they make, and how they change,
How oft from Phoebus do they flee to Pan ;
Unsettled still, like haggards wild they range,
These gentle birds that fly from man to man ;
Who would not scorn and shake them from the fist,
And let them fly, fair fools, which way they list ?

Yet for our sport we fawn and flatter both,
To pass the time when nothing else can please,
And train them to our lure with subtle oath,
Till, weary of their wiles, ourselves we ease ;
And then we say when we their fancy try,
To play with fools, O what a fool was I !

Schelling, Felix E., Ed. A Book of Elizabethan Lyrics.
Boston: Ginn and Company, 1895. 33.

to the Works of Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford


©2003 Anniina Jokinen Dirck de Quade van Ravesteyn. Venus Riding a Satyr, 1602-08.