Delights.

Bloomer, Winter Hares, 1999

Now winter nights enlarge

    The number of their hours;

And clouds their storms discharge

    Upon the airy towers.

Let now the chimneys blaze

    And cups o’erflow with wine,

Let well-turned words amaze

    With harmony divine.

Now yellow waxen lights

    Shall wait on honey love

While youthful revels, masques, and courtly sights

    Sleep’s leaden spells remove.

This time doth well dispense

    With lovers’ long discourse;

Much speech hath some defense,

    Though beauty no remorse.

All do not all things well;

    Some measures comely tread,

Some knotted riddles tell,

    Some poems smoothly read.

The summer hath his joys,

    And winter his delights;

Though love and all his pleasures are but toys,

    They shorten tedious nights.

Thomas Champion