The Passionate Shepherd to His Love
by Christopher Marlowe

English dramatist and poet. He wrote six plays including his best-known work, The Tragical History of Dr Faustus (1589). He translated some of Ovid's Amores and Book One of Lucan's Pharsilia (1593). His original poetry includes Hero and Leander (1593), a mythological narrative, and The Passionate Shepherd to His Love. The latter, a pastoral lyric, inspired many fine replies such as Sir Walter Ralegh's The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd and John Donne's The Bait. He was the first great Elizabethan dramatist and his work set the stage for Shakespeare whom he influenced considerably.

Christopher Marlowe

The Passionate Shepherd to His Love
by Christopher Marlowe

Come live with me, and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove,
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
And all the craggy mountain yields.

There we will sit upon the rocks,
And see the shepherds feed their flocks
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

And I will make thee beds of roses,
With a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers and a kirtle
Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle;

A gown made of the finest wool,
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold;

A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs;
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me, and be my love.

The shepherd swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me, and be my love.

Christopher Marlowe

The Passionate Shepherd to His Love by Christopher Marlowe