Tuesday Hoisted from the Non-Internet from 600 Years Ago: Tom O'Bedlam
From the hag and hungry goblin,/That into rags would rend ye,
The spirit that stands/By the naked man
In the Book of Moons, defend ye,That of your five sound senses,/You never be forsaken,
Nor wander from/Yourselves with Tom,
Abroad to beg your bacon.
While I do sing "Any food, any feeding?/Money, drink, or clothing?
Come dame or maid,/Be not afraid--
Poor Tom will injure nothing."Of thirty bare years have I,/Twice twenty been enraged,
And of forty been/Three times fifteen,
in durance soundly caged,In the lordly lofts of Bedlam,/With the stubble soft and dainty,
Brave bracelets strong,/Sweet whips ding-dong,
With wholesome hunger plenty.While I do sing "Any food, any feeding?/Money, drink, or clothing?
Come dame or maid,/Be not afraid--
Poor Tom will injure nothing."With a thought I took for Maudlin,/And a cruse of cockle pottage.
With a thing thus tall,/Sky bless you all,
I befell into this dotage.I slept not since the Conquest,/Till then I never waked.
Till the roguish boy/Of love where I lay
Me found and stripped me naked.While I do sing "Any food, any feeding?/Money, drink, or clothing?
Come dame or maid,/Be not afraid--
Poor Tom will injure nothing."When short I have shorn my sow's face,/And swigged my horny barrel,
In an oaken inn,/I pound my skin
As a suit of gilt apparel.The Moon's my constant mistress,/And the lonely owl my marrow.
The flaming drake/and the night crow make
Me music to my sorrow.While I do sing "Any food, any feeding?/Money, drink, or clothing?
Come dame or maid,/Be not afraid--
Poor Tom will injure nothing."The palsy plagues my pulses,/When I prig your pigs or pullen.
Your culvers take,/or matchless make
Your Chanticleer or Sullen.When I want provant, with Humphry/I sup, and when benighted,
I repose in Paul's/with waking souls,
Yet never am affrighted.While I do sing "Any food, any feeding?/Money, drink, or clothing?
Come dame or maid,/Be not afraid--
Poor Tom will injure nothing."I know more than Apollo,/For oft when he lies sleeping
I see the stars/at mortal wars
In the wounded welkin weeping.The moon embrace her shepherd,/And the Queen of Love her warrior,
While the first doth horn/the star of morn,
and the next the heavenly Farrier.While I do sing "Any food, any feeding?/Money, drink, or clothing?
Come dame or maid,/Be not afraid--
Poor Tom will injure nothing."The Gypsies, Snap and Pedro,/Are none of Tom's comradoes,
The punk I scorn,/and the cutpurse sworn
And the roaring boy's bravadoes.The meek, the white, the gentle,/Me handle not nor spare not;
But those that cross/Tom Rynosseross
Do what the panther dare not.While I do sing "Any food, any feeding?/Money, drink, or clothing?
Come dame or maid,/Be not afraid--
Poor Tom will injure nothing."With an host of furious fancies,/Whereof I am commander.
With a burning spear/And a horse of Air,
To the wilderness I wander.By a knight of ghosts and shadows,/I summoned am to tourney
Ten leagues beyond/The wild world's end-- Methinks it is no journey. ..."
