Your Wednesday dose of melancholy

A Booke of Ayres.

                    IX.

The Sypres curten of the night is spread,
And ouer all a silent dewe is cast.
The weaker cares by sleepe are conquered ;
But I alone, with hideous griefe, agast,
In spite of Morpheus charmes, a watch doe keepe
Over mine eies, to banish carelesse sleepe.

Yet oft my trembling eyes through faintnes close,
And then the Mappe of hell before me stands,
Which Ghosts doe see, and I am one of those
Ordain'd to pine in sorrowes endles bands,
Since from my wretched soule all hopes are reft
And now no cause of life to me is left.

Griefe, ceaze my soule, for that will still endure
When my cras'd bodie is consum'd and gone,
Bear it to thy blacke denne, there keepe it sure,
Where thou ten thousand soules doest tyre vpon.
But all doe not affoord such foode to thee
As this poore one, the worser part of mee.

 
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Source:
Campion, Thomas. Campion's Works. Percival Vivian, Ed.
Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1909. 167.