VULCAN'S SONG

by: John Lyly (1553-1606)

      Y shag-hair Cyclops, come, let's ply
      Our Lemnian hammers lustily.
      By my wife's sparrows,
      I swear these arrows
      Shall singing fly
      Through many a wanton's eye.
       
      These headed are with golden blisses,
      These silver ones feathered with kisses;
      But this of lead
      Strikes a clown dead,
      When in a dance
      He falls in a trance,
      To see his black-brow lass not buss him,
      And then whines out for death t' untruss him.
      So, so: our work being done, let's play:
      Holiday, boys! cry holiday!

"Vulcan's Song" was originally published in Lyly's Sappho and Phao (1584).

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