Shakespeare's songs from his plays illustrate the Elizabethan forms of the song. Spanning the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, these songs include “When Daises Pied” from Love's Labour's Lost (1598).

In his famous poem “To Penthurst” (1616), Jonson celebrates the values of serenity and good humor in a setting reminiscent of the Garden of Eden.

Jonson's classic satire Volpone (1606) focuses on the consequences of greed.

For a comparative study of the love poetry of the age, read Anne Ferry's All in War with Time: Love Poetry of Shakespeare, Donne, Jonson, Marvell (1975).