Published in 1610,[1] late in Dowland's career, the song shows the influence of Italian music of the early baroque.
10 in A Musical Banquet [nl], a 1610 anthology of songs for lute and voice from England, France, Italy, and Spain compiled by Robert Dowland, John's son.
The text for Dowland's setting utilizes the first stanza of an anonymous poem included in the 1606 song collection Funeral Teares by John Coprario.
In darkness let me dwell; the ground shall sorrow be, The roof despair, to bar all cheerful light from me; The walls of marble black, that moist'ned still shall weep; My music, hellish jarring sounds, to banish friendly sleep.
Second stanza included in the Coprario 1606 setting: My dainties grief shall be, and tears my poisoned wine, My sighs the air through which my panting heart shall pine, My robes my mind shall suit exceeding blackest night, My study shall be tragic thoughts sad fancy to delight, Pale ghosts and frightful shades shall my acquaintance be: O thus, my hapless joy, I haste to thee.