Heloise

 

A 12th-century poem out of the book The Horizon Book of the Middle Ages, ostensibly written by philosopher Peter Abelard.  

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Mounting clouds of heart's affliction
Dim my happy star
Laughter on my lips were fiction
Such my sorrows are

Gladdening my heart
The nearest friend of all
I count my dearest
She is stolen away

She, the flowering spray
(She, the flowering spray)
She, the flowering spray

She when maidens dance love's dances
Puts the rest to shame
Phoebes' glorious light enhances
Her celestial name

Heavenly lights her eyes
Ever her I cherish
Not to cherish is to perish
Nothing else I prize

[Chorus]

Now I seek with eyelids swollen
Hours for lonely grief
I who thanks to night have stolen
Kisses like a thief

Dear lips, now long gone
How the spice of your caresses
Once perfumed my heart's recesses
Sweet, as cinnamon

[Chorus]

Time wears on and hope receding
Yields no comfort yet
Youth to age is ever speeding
Ageless is regret

Our division seems sure
To last till sad disunion
Blights our love and love's communion
Fades, like fading dreams

[Chorus]