Your ladyship--forgive my boldness--suff...

Your ladyship--forgive my boldness--suffers

from not infrequent fits of giddiness;

not mental, maybe, rather temperamental.

What was the use of holding out such hopes

that as you know the strain of my excitement

when first we spoke, brought me to such a state

that I was ill in bed for nearly a month,"

if when you find I'm cool, you turn to fire

and blaze with living flame, but when I burn

you freeze again to solid ice and snow?"

If only you would leave me with Marcela!

But no, you're like the dog in Aesop's fable;

you couldn't bear to let me marry her,

you're too consumed with jealousy for that,

but when you find I've turned from her to you,

you drive me mad and shatter my illusions.

Eat, or let others eat, then; I can't live

on empty hopes. Take me, or else I'm going

to love again the one I know loves me.

Lope de Vega. The Dog in the Manger. Trans. Victor Dixon. Carleton Renaissance Plays in Translation. Ottawa, Dovehouse Editions, 1990. pp. 84-85.