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[OMACL release #1]

Book of the Duchesse

by Geoffrey Chaucer


The following text is based on that published in THE COMPLETE
WORKS OF GEOFFREY CHAUCER, ed. W.W. Skeat (Oxford, 1899). This
work is in the PUBLIC DOMAIN.

This electronic edition was edited, proofed, and prepared by
Douglas B. Killings (DeTroyes@AOL.COM), September 1994, based
upon a previous e-text of unknown origin. Additional assistance
provided by Diane M. Brendan.

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THE PROEM

1 I have gret wonder, be this lighte,
2 How that I live, for day ne nighte
3 I may nat slepe wel nigh noght,
4 I have so many an ydel thoght
5 Purely for defaute of slepe
6 That, by my trouthe, I take no kepe
7 Of no-thing, how hit cometh or goth,
8 Ne me nis no-thing leef nor loth.
9 Al is y-liche good to me --
10 Ioye or sorowe, wherso hyt be --
11 For I have feling in no-thinge,
12 But, as it were, a mased thing,
13 Alway in point to falle a-doun;
14 For sorwful imaginacioun
15 Is alway hoolly in my minde.
16 And wel ye wite, agaynes kynde
17 Hit were to liven in this wyse;
18 For nature wolde nat suffyse
19 To noon erthely creature
20 Not longe tyme to endure
21 Withoute slepe, and been in sorwe;
22 And I ne may, ne night ne morwe,
23 Slepe; and thus melancolye
24 And dreed I have for to dye,
25 Defaute of slepe and hevinesse
26 Hath sleyn my spirit of quiknesse,
27 That I have lost al lustihede.
28 Suche fantasies ben in myn hede
29 So I not what is best to do.
30 But men myght axe me, why soo