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 31 I may not slepe, and what me is? 32 But natheles, who aske this 33 Leseth his asking trewely. 34 My-selven can not telle why 35 The sooth; but trewely, as I gesse, 36 I holde hit be a siknesse 37 That I have suffred this eight yere, 38 And yet my bote is never the nere; 39 For ther is phisicien but oon, 40 That may me hele; but that is doon. (from Chaucer's The Book of the Duchess)