I prithee send me back my heart

I prithee send me back my heart
Since I cannot have thine,
For if from yours you will not part
Why then should you keep mine?

Yet now I think on it let it lie
To send it me were vain,
For thou'st a thief in either eye
Will steal it back again.

Why should two hearts in one breast lie
And yet not lodge together?
O love where is thy sympathy
If thus our hearts thou sever?

But love is such a mystery
I cannot find it out,
For when I think I'm best resolved
Then am I most in doubt.

Then farewell care and farewell woe,
I will no longer pine;
But I'll believe I have his heart
As much as he hath mine.

sometimes misattributed to Henry Hughes (c1602-c1652)
by Sir John Suckling (1609-1642)

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive)

by Jean Berger (1909-2002) , no title, published 1984, from Amoretti: Five love songs on poems by 16th and 17th century authors, no. 5.
by Henry Lawes (c1595-1662) , "I prithee send me back my heart"

by Frank Valentin Van der Stucken (1858-1929) , "Fond request", published 1908. [voice and piano]

Added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.

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