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henry lawes - ariadne lyrics

theseus, o theseus, hark!
but yet in vain;
alas deserted i complain;
it was some neighb’ring rock
more soft then he
whose hollow bowels pitty’d me
and beating back that false & cruell name
did comfort and revenge my shame
the faithless whither wilt thou flye?
stones dare not harbour cruelty

tell me ye gods
who e’re ye are
why, o why, made ye him so faire?
& tell mе wretch why thou
mad’st not thy selfe morе true?
beauty from him might copies take
& more majestick heroes make
and falshood learn a wile from him too
to beguile: restore my clue
’tis here most due
for ’tis a labrinth of more subtle art
to have so faire a face, so fowle a heart:

the rav’nous vulter tear his breast
the rowling stone disturbe his rest;
let him next feele ixions wheel
& add one fable more to
cursing poets store
& then yet rather let him live
& twine his woof of days
with some thread stoln from mine;
but if you’l torture him
how e’re torture my heart
you’l find him there
till mine eyes drank up his and his drank mine
i ne’r thought souls might kiss, & spirits joyne:
pictures till then, took me as much as men
nature and art moveing alike my heart;
but his faire visage made me find pleasures and fears
hopes, sighs and tears, as severall seasons of the mind

should thine eye venus on his dwell
thou wouldst invite him to thy sh+ll
& caught by that live jet
venture the second net
and after all thy dangers faithlesse he;
shouldst thou but slumber
would forsake en’n thee

the streams so court the yielding bankes
and gliding thence ne’re pay their thankes
the winds so woo the flowers
whisp’ring among fresh bowers
and having rob’d them of their smels
flye thence perfum’d to other cels;
this is familiar hate, to smile, & k!ll
though nothing pleas thee
yet my ruin will:
death hover, hover, o’re me then
waves let your christall womb
be both my fate and tomb
i’le sooner trust the sea then men
yet for revenge to heav’n i’le call
and breath one curse before i fall;
proud of two conquests, minotaure and me
that by my faith, this by thy perjurie
may’st thou forget to wing thy ships with white
that the black sails may to the longing sight
of thy gray father tell thy fate
and he bequeath that sea his name
falling like me

nature & love thus brand thee
whilst i dye, ’cause thou forsak’st aegeus
’cause thou draw’st nigh
and ye, o nimphs below who sit
in whose swift floods his vows he writ
sn+tch a sharp diamond from your richer mines
& in some mirror grave these sadder lines;
which let some god convey to him
that so he may in that both read at once
and see those lookes that caus’d my destiny

in thetis armes i ariadne sleep, drown’d:
first in mine own tears, then in the deep:
twice banish’d, first by love, and then by hate
the life that i preserv’d became my fate
who leaving all was by him left alone
that from a monster fre’d, himselfe prov’d one:
thus then i f+++ but looke, o mine eyes
be now true spies, yonder, yonder comes my dear
now my wonder, once my fear;
see satyrs dance along in a confused throng
whilst h+rns and pipes rude noice
do mad their l+sty joyes;
roses his forhead crown
& that recrowns the flowers;
where he walks up and down
he makes the desarts bowers;
the ivy and the grape hide not
adorne his shape
and green leaves cloath his waving rod
’tis he; ’tis either theseus or some god

- henry lawes lyrics

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