Favourite Poems: Forget Not Yet The Tried Intent

I've decided to start a new series on this blog, a series in which I feature some of my favourite poems, and comment on them as appropriately.

The first is "Forget Not Yet" by Sir Thomas Wyatt the Elder (1503-1542). Wyatt is the earliest English language poet whose work I enjoy. (This doesn't include various ballads and anonymous pieces).

There isn't really a whole lot to say about this poem. The pathos and vulnerability of the simple refrain "Forget not yet" gives it much of its power. I like the way every stanza ends with a dying fall. I especially like the rhythm and cumulative force of the stanza that begins: "Forget not yet the great essays..." I also like the way the poem 

The poem has a simplicity and directness which is all-too-rare for the Elizabethan era. Those Elizabethans really liked to gussy things up.

I've always assumed this is a poem addressed to a beloved lady, an example of courtly love. Might it be some kind of religious or political allegory instead? Who knows? I've never read any commentary on this poem. But it seems most likely to be a simple love poem.

Forget not yet the tried intent
Of such a truth as I have meant;
My great travail so gladly spent,
Forget not yet.

Forget not yet when first began
The weary life ye know, since whan
The suit, the service, none tell can;
Forget not yet.

Forget not yet the great assays,
The cruel wrong, the scornful ways;
The painful patience in denays,
Forget not yet.

Forget not yet, forget not this,
How long ago hath been and is
The mind that never meant amiss;
Forget not yet.

Forget not then thine own approved,
The which so long hath thee so loved,
Whose steadfast faith yet never moved;
Forget not this.