Against Women Inconstant

Ballade.

Madame, in your love of novelty you have banished many a lover from grace. I take leave of your unsteadfastness, for well I wot so long as you live you cannot love for a full half-year in one place. Ever sharp is your appetite after new things; thus instead of blue you may wear naught but green.

Even as no image can be fixed upon a mirror, but lightly as it comes, so passes it, likewise is your love, so your deeds bear witness. No fidelity can clasp your heart, but you fare like a weathercock which turns his face with every wind, and that is manifest. Instead of blue you may wear naught but green.

For your fickleness you should be put in a pillory rather than Delilah, Criseyde or Candace; for your only constancy is in changing. That vice none can root out of your heart. If you lose one lover, you can easily acquire twain. All lightly clad for summer,- you well know what I would say-, instead of blue you may wear naught but green.

Explicit.