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Chaucer's Works, Volume 3 — The House of Fame; The Legend of Good Women; The Treatise on the Astrolabe; The Sources of the Canterbury Tales — John Shaqi

Chaucer's Works, Volume 3 — The House of Fame; The Legend of Good Women; The Treatise on the Astrolabe; The Sources of the Canterbury TalesChaucer, Geoffrey

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Chaucer's Works, Volume 3 — The House of Fame; The Legend of Good Women; The Treatise on the Astrolabe; The Sources of the Canterbury Tales

Name: Chaucer's Works, Volume 3 — The House of Fame; The Legend of Good Women; The Treatise on the Astrolabe; The Sources of the Canterbury Tales
Author: Chaucer, Geoffrey

Chaucer, Geoffrey

English poetry -- Middle English, 1100-1500

But at my ginning, trusteth wel,
  I wol make invocacioun,
  With special devocioun,
  Unto the god of slepe anoon,
  That dwelleth in a cave of stoon                                       70
  Upon a streem that comth fro Lete,
  That is a flood of helle unswete;
  Besyde a folk men clepe Cimerie,
  Ther slepeth ay this god unmerie
  With his slepy thousand sones                                          75
  That alway for to slepe hir wone is--
  And to this god, that I of rede,
  Preye I, that he wol me spede
  My sweven for to telle aright,
  If every dreem stonde in his might.                                    80
  And he, that mover is of al
  That is and was, and ever shal,
  So yive hem Ioye that hit here
  Of alle that they dreme to-yere,
  And for to stonden alle in grace                                       85
  Of hir loves, or in what place
  That hem wer levest for to stonde,
  And shelde hem fro povert and shonde,
  And fro unhappe and ech disese,
  And sende hem al that may hem plese,                                   90
  That take hit wel, and scorne hit noght,
  Ne hit misdemen in her thoght
  Through malicious entencioun.
  And who-so, through presumpcioun,
  Or hate or scorne, or through envye,                                   95
  Dispyt, or Iape, or vilanye,
  Misdeme hit, preye I Iesus god
  That (dreme he barfoot, dreme he shod),
  That every harm that any man
  Hath had, sith [that] the world began,                                100
  Befalle him therof, or he sterve,
  And graunte he mote hit ful deserve,
  Lo! with swich a conclusioun
  As had of his avisioun
  Cresus, that was king of Lyde,                                        105
  That high upon a gebet dyde!
  This prayer shal he have of me;
  I am no bet in charite!
    Now herkneth, as I have you seyd,
  What that I mette, or I abreyd.                                       110

          _The Dream._

Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.

Chaucer's Works, Volume 3 — The House of Fame; The Legend of Good Women; The Treatise on the Astrolabe; The Sources of the Canterbury Tales

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