Writing in pen in the Canterbury Tales

 

"Sick-hearted Damian in Venus' fire

Is so consumed, he's dying with desire;

And so he took his courage in his hand

To end a grief he could no longer stand

And with a pen that he contrived to borrow

He wrote a letter pouring out his sorrow,

After a fashion of a song or lay,

Indited to his lady, dazzling May,

And wrapped it in a purse of silk apart

To hang inside his shirt, upon his heart.

Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, 1392.