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High Romance Poetry

Romantic Poetry of
John Donne (1572-1631)

John Donne was a fascinating man. Erotic poet (just how much of his poetry came from experience and how much was either playful literature or private fantasy is hard to gauge) he later became a preacher and holy hymnodist. Though some of his poetry treats women as objects (a reflection of his time), other poems certainly do not do so. Some critics note that he seemed to change in his attitude toward women, many poems seeming to be more about him and his own feelings than the woman, who is a mere prop. But other poems make the woman the mover, and Donne the moved. Perhaps they laid the groundwork for his sacred poetry, which though heavily introspective is also about the Unmoved Mover / Lover Who's passion pushes Donne from the stage of his own mind and his own literature.

Below are some of his earlier works, those we like extra-well with bolded titles. We end with one of the sacred poems, though most are not included here at this time.

Index:

Air and Angels
The Apparition
The Bait
The Canonization
The Dream
The Ecstasy
The Funeral
The Indifferent
A Fever
A Jet Ring Sent
A Lecture Upon the Shadow
A Valediction of My Name, in the Window
Another of the Same
Break of Day
Community
Elegy VIII: The Comparison
Elegy X: The Dream
Elegy XIII: His Parting From Her
Elegy XVI: The Expostulation
Elegy XVIII
Elegy XIX
Elegy XX: To His Mistress Going to Bed
The Expiration
An Epithalamion, or Marriage Song on the Lady Elizabeth and Count Palatine Being Married on St. Valentine's Day
Epithalamion Made at Lincoln's Inn
Eclogue
I. The Time of the Marriage
II. Equality of Persons
III. Raising of the Bridegroom
IV. Raising of the Bride
V. Her Apparelling
VI. Going to the Chapel
VII. The Benediction
VIII. Feasts and Revels
IX. The Bride's Going to Bed
X. The Bridegroom's Coming
XI. The Good-Night
Farewell to Love
The Flea
The Good-Morrow
The Paradox
The Token
The Undertaking
The Will
Love's Alchemy
Love's Deity
Love's Usury
Love's War
Lovers' Infiniteness
The Relic
Go and Catch a Falling Star
Sweetest Love, I Do Not Go
The Sun Rising
The Triple Fool
A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
A Valediction: Of Weeping
Batter My Heart

 

 

 

Air and Angels

1 Twice or thrice had I lov'd thee,
2 Before I knew thy face or name;
3 So in a voice, so in a shapeless flame
4 Angels affect us oft, and worshipp'd be;
5 Still when, to where thou wert, I came,
6 Some lovely glorious nothing I did see.
7 But since my soul, whose child love is,
8 Takes limbs of flesh, and else could nothing do,
9 More subtle than the parent is
10 Love must not be, but take a body too;
11 And therefore what thou wert, and who,
12 I bid Love ask, and now
13 That it assume thy body, I allow,
14 And fix itself in thy lip, eye, and brow.

15 Whilst thus to ballast love I thought,
16 And so more steadily to have gone,
17 With wares which would sink admiration,
18 I saw I had love's pinnace overfraught;
19 Ev'ry thy hair for love to work upon
20 Is much too much, some fitter must be sought;
21 For, nor in nothing, nor in things
22 Extreme, and scatt'ring bright, can love inhere;
23 Then, as an angel, face, and wings
24 Of air, not pure as it, yet pure, doth wear,
25 So thy love may be my love's sphere;
26 Just such disparity
27 As is 'twixt air and angels' purity,
28 'Twixt women's love, and men's, will ever be.

 

The Apparition

1 When by thy scorn, O murd'ress, I am dead
2 And that thou think'st thee free
3 From all solicitation from me,
4 Then shall my ghost come to thy bed,
5 And thee, feign'd vestal, in worse arms shall see;
6 Then thy sick taper will begin to wink,
7 And he, whose thou art then, being tir'd before,
8 Will, if thou stir, or pinch to wake him, think
9 Thou call'st for more,
10 And in false sleep will from thee shrink;
11 And then, poor aspen wretch, neglected thou
12 Bath'd in a cold quicksilver sweat wilt lie
13 A verier ghost than I.
14 What I will say, I will not tell thee now,
15 Lest that preserve thee; and since my love is spent,
16 I'had rather thou shouldst painfully repent,
17 Than by my threat'nings rest still innocent.

 

The Bait

1 Come live with me, and be my love,
2 And we will some new pleasures prove
3 Of golden sands, and crystal brooks,
4 With silken lines, and silver hooks.

5 There will the river whispering run
6 Warm'd by thy eyes, more than the sun;
7 And there the 'enamour'd fish will stay,
8 Begging themselves they may betray.

9 When thou wilt swim in that live bath,
10 Each fish, which every channel hath,
11 Will amorously to thee swim,
12 Gladder to catch thee, than thou him.

13 If thou, to be so seen, be'st loth,
14 By sun or moon, thou dark'nest both,
15 And if myself have leave to see,
16 I need not their light having thee.

17 Let others freeze with angling reeds,
18 And cut their legs with shells and weeds,
19 Or treacherously poor fish beset,
20 With strangling snare, or windowy net.

21 Let coarse bold hands from slimy nest
22 The bedded fish in banks out-wrest;
23 Or curious traitors, sleeve-silk flies,
24 Bewitch poor fishes' wand'ring eyes.

25 For thee, thou need'st no such deceit,
26 For thou thyself art thine own bait:
27 That fish, that is not catch'd thereby,
28 Alas, is wiser far than I.

 

The Canonization

1 For God's sake hold your tongue, and let me love,
2 Or chide my palsy, or my gout,
3 My five grey hairs, or ruin'd fortune flout,
4 With wealth your state, your mind with arts improve,
5 Take you a course, get you a place,
6 Observe his Honour, or his Grace,
7 Or the King's real, or his stamped face
8 Contemplate, what you will, approve,
9 So you will let me love.

10 Alas, alas, who's injur'd by my love?
11 What merchant's ships have my sighs drown'd?
12 Who says my tears have overflow'd his ground?
13 When did my colds a forward spring remove?
14 When did the heats which my veins fill
15 Add one more to the plaguy bill?
16 Soldiers find wars, and lawyers find out still
17 Litigious men, which quarrels move,
18 Though she and I do love.

19 Call us what you will, we are made such by love;
20 Call her one, me another fly,
21 We'are tapers too, and at our own cost die,
22 And we in us find the'eagle and the dove.
23 The ph{oe}nix riddle hath more wit
24 By us; we two being one, are it.
25 So, to one neutral thing both sexes fit,
26 We die and rise the same, and prove
27 Mysterious by this love.

28 We can die by it, if not live by love,
29 And if unfit for tombs and hearse
30 Our legend be, it will be fit for verse;
31 And if no piece of chronicle we prove,
32 We'll build in sonnets pretty rooms;
33 As well a well-wrought urn becomes
34 The greatest ashes, as half-acre tombs,
35 And by these hymns all shall approve
36 Us canoniz'd for love;

37 And thus invoke us: "You, whom reverend love
38 Made one another's hermitage;
39 You, to whom love was peace, that now is rage;
40 Who did the whole world's soul contract, and drove
41 Into the glasses of your eyes
42 (So made such mirrors, and such spies,
43 That they did all to you epitomize)
44 Countries, towns, courts: beg from above
45 A pattern of your love!"

 

The Dream

1 Dear love, for nothing less than thee
2 Would I have broke this happy dream;
3 It was a theme
4 For reason, much too strong for fantasy,
5 Therefore thou wak'd'st me wisely; yet
6 My dream thou brok'st not, but continued'st it.
7 Thou art so true that thoughts of thee suffice
8 To make dreams truths, and fables histories;
9 Enter these arms, for since thou thought'st it best,
10 Not to dream all my dream, let's act the rest.

11 As lightning, or a taper's light,
12 Thine eyes, and not thy noise wak'd me;
13 Yet I thought thee
14 (For thou lovest truth) an angel, at first sight;
15 But when I saw thou sawest my heart,
16 And knew'st my thoughts, beyond an angel's art,
17 When thou knew'st what I dreamt, when thou knew'st when
18 Excess of joy would wake me, and cam'st then,
19 I must confess, it could not choose but be
20 Profane, to think thee any thing but thee.

21 Coming and staying show'd thee, thee,
22 But rising makes me doubt, that now
23 Thou art not thou.
24 That love is weak where fear's as strong as he;
25 'Tis not all spirit, pure and brave,
26 If mixture it of fear, shame, honour have;
27 Perchance as torches, which must ready be,
28 Men light and put out, so thou deal'st with me;
29 Thou cam'st to kindle, goest to come; then I
30 Will dream that hope again, but else would die.

 

The Ecstasy

1 Where, like a pillow on a bed
2 A pregnant bank swell'd up to rest
3 The violet's reclining head,
4 Sat we two, one another's best.
5 Our hands were firmly cemented
6 With a fast balm, which thence did spring;
7 Our eye-beams twisted, and did thread
8 Our eyes upon one double string;
9 So to'intergraft our hands, as yet
10 Was all the means to make us one,
11 And pictures in our eyes to get
12 Was all our propagation.
13 As 'twixt two equal armies fate
14 Suspends uncertain victory,
15 Our souls (which to advance their state
16 Were gone out) hung 'twixt her and me.
17 And whilst our souls negotiate there,
18 We like sepulchral statues lay;
19 All day, the same our postures were,
20 And we said nothing, all the day.
21 If any, so by love refin'd
22 That he soul's language understood,
23 And by good love were grown all mind,
24 Within convenient distance stood,
25 He (though he knew not which soul spake,
26 Because both meant, both spake the same)
27 Might thence a new concoction take
28 And part far purer than he came.
29 This ecstasy doth unperplex,
30 We said, and tell us what we love;
31 We see by this it was not sex,
32 We see we saw not what did move;
33 But as all several souls contain
34 Mixture of things, they know not what,
35 Love these mix'd souls doth mix again
36 And makes both one, each this and that.
37 A single violet transplant,
38 The strength, the colour, and the size,
39 (All which before was poor and scant)
40 Redoubles still, and multiplies.
41 When love with one another so
42 Interinanimates two souls,
43 That abler soul, which thence doth flow,
44 Defects of loneliness controls.
45 We then, who are this new soul, know
46 Of what we are compos'd and made,
47 For th' atomies of which we grow
48 Are souls. whom no change can invade.
49 But oh alas, so long, so far,
50 Our bodies why do we forbear?
51 They'are ours, though they'are not we; we are
52 The intelligences, they the spheres.
53 We owe them thanks, because they thus
54 Did us, to us, at first convey,
55 Yielded their senses' force to us,
56 Nor are dross to us, but allay.
57 On man heaven's influence works not so,
58 But that it first imprints the air;
59 So soul into the soul may flow,
60 Though it to body first repair.
61 As our blood labors to beget
62 Spirits, as like souls as it can,
63 Because such fingers need to knit
64 That subtle knot which makes us man,
65 So must pure lovers' souls descend
66 T' affections, and to faculties,
67 Which sense may reach and apprehend,
68 Else a great prince in prison lies.
69 To'our bodies turn we then, that so
70 Weak men on love reveal'd may look;
71 Love's mysteries in souls do grow,
72 But yet the body is his book.
73 And if some lover, such as we,
74 Have heard this dialogue of one,
75 Let him still mark us, he shall see
76 Small change, when we'are to bodies gone.

 

The Funeral

1 Whoever comes to shroud me, do not harm
2 Nor question much
3 That subtle wreath of hair, which crowns my arm;
4 The mystery, the sign, you must not touch,
5 For 'tis my outward soul,
6 Viceroy to that, which then to heaven being gone,
7 Will leave this to control
8 And keep these limbs, her provinces, from dissolution.

9 For if the sinewy thread my brain lets fall
10 Through every part
11 Can tie those parts, and make me one of all,
12 Those hairs which upward grew, and strength and art
13 Have from a better brain,
14 Can better do'it; except she meant that I
15 By this should know my pain,
16 As prisoners then are manacled, when they'are condemn'd to die.

17 Whate'er she meant by'it, bury it with me,
18 For since I am
19 Love's martyr, it might breed idolatry,
20 If into other hands these relics came;
21 As 'twas humility
22 To afford to it all that a soul can do,
23 So, 'tis some bravery,
24 That since you would have none of me, I bury some of you.

 

The Indifferent

1 I can love both fair and brown;
2 Her whom abundance melts, and her whom want betrays;
3 Her who loves loneness best, and her who masks and plays;
4 Her whom the country form'd, and whom the town;
5 Her who believes, and her who tries;
6 Her who still weeps with spongy eyes,
7 And her who is dry cork, and never cries.
8 I can love her, and her, and you, and you;
9 I can love any, so she be not true.

10 Will no other vice content you?
11 Will it not serve your turn to do as did your mothers?
12 Or have you all old vices spent and now would find out others?
13 Or doth a fear that men are true torment you?
14 O we are not, be not you so;
15 Let me--and do you--twenty know;
16 Rob me, but bind me not, and let me go.
17 Must I, who came to travel thorough you,
18 Grow your fix'd subject, because you are true?

19 Venus heard me sigh this song;
20 And by love's sweetest part, variety, she swore,
21 She heard not this till now, and that it should be so no more.
22 She went, examin'd, and return'd ere long,
23 And said, "Alas! some two or three
24 Poor heretics in love there be,
25 Which think to stablish dangerous constancy.
26 But I told them, 'Since you will be true,
27 You shall be true to them who'are false to you'."

 

A Fever

O ! DO not die, for I shall hate
All women so, when thou art gone,
That thee I shall not celebrate,
When I remember thou wast one.
But yet thou canst not die, I know ;
To leave this world behind, is death ;
But when thou from this world wilt go,
The whole world vapours with thy breath.

Or if, when thou, the world's soul, go'st,
It stay, 'tis but thy carcase then ;
The fairest woman, but thy ghost,
But corrupt worms, the worthiest men.

O wrangling schools, that search what fire
Shall burn this world, had none the wit
Unto this knowledge to aspire,
That this her feaver might be it?

And yet she cannot waste by this,
Nor long bear this torturing wrong,
For more corruption needful is,
To fuel such a fever long.

These burning fits but meteors be,
Whose matter in thee is soon spent ;
Thy beauty, and all parts, which are thee,
Are unchangeable firmament.

Yet 'twas of my mind, seizing thee,
Though it in thee cannot perséver ;
For I had rather owner be
Of thee one hour, than all else ever.

 

A Jet Ring Sent

THOU art not so black as my heart,
Nor half so brittle as her heart, thou art ;
What would'st thou say ? shall both our properties by thee be spoke,
—Nothing more endless, nothing sooner broke?

Marriage rings are not of this stuff ;
Oh, why should ought less precious, or less tough
Figure our loves ? except in thy name thou have bid it say,
"—I'm cheap, and nought but fashion ; fling me away."

Yet stay with me since thou art come,
Circle this finger's top, which didst her thumb ;
Be justly proud, and gladly safe, that thou dost dwell with me ;
She that, O ! broke her faith, would soon break thee.

 

A Lecture Upon the Shadow

1 Stand still, and I will read to thee
2 A lecture, love, in love's philosophy.
3 These three hours that we have spent,
4 Walking here, two shadows went
5 Along with us, which we ourselves produc'd.
6 But, now the sun is just above our head,
7 We do those shadows tread,
8 And to brave clearness all things are reduc'd.
9 So whilst our infant loves did grow,
10 Disguises did, and shadows, flow
11 From us, and our cares; but now 'tis not so.
12 That love has not attain'd the high'st degree,
13 Which is still diligent lest others see.

14 Except our loves at this noon stay,
15 We shall new shadows make the other way.
16 As the first were made to blind
17 Others, these which come behind
18 Will work upon ourselves, and blind our eyes.
19 If our loves faint, and westwardly decline,
20 To me thou, falsely, thine,
21 And I to thee mine actions shall disguise.
22 The morning shadows wear away,
23 But these grow longer all the day;
24 But oh, love's day is short, if love decay.
25 Love is a growing, or full constant light,
26 And his first minute, after noon, is night.

 

A Valediction of My Name, in the Window

I.

MY name engraved herein
Doth contribute my firmness to this glass,
Which ever since that charm hath been
As hard, as that which graved it was ;
Thine eye will give it price enough, to mock
The diamonds of either rock.

II.

'Tis much that glass should be
As all-confessing, and through-shine as I ;
'Tis more that it shows thee to thee,
And clear reflects thee to thine eye.
But all such rules love's magic can undo ;
Here you see me, and I am you.

III.

As no one point, nor dash,
Which are but accessories to this name,
The showers and tempests can outwash
So shall all times find me the same ;
You this entireness better may fulfill,
Who have the pattern with you still.

IV.

Or if too hard and deep
This learning be, for a scratch'd name to teach,
It as a given death's head keep,
Lovers' mortality to preach ;
Or think this ragged bony name to be
My ruinous anatomy.

V.

Then, as all my souls be
Emparadised in you—in whom alone
I understand, and grow, and see—
The rafters of my body, bone,
Being still with you, the muscle, sinew, and vein
Which tile this house, will come again.

VI.

Till my return repair
And recompact my scatter'd body so,
As all the virtuous powers which are
Fix'd in the stars are said to flow
Into such characters as gravèd be
When these stars have supremacy.

VII.

So since this name was cut,
When love and grief their exaltation had,
No door 'gainst this name's influence shut.
As much more loving, as more sad,
'Twill make thee ; and thou shouldst, till I return,
Since I die daily, daily mourn.

VIII.

When thy inconsiderate hand
Flings open this casement, with my trembling name,
To look on one, whose wit or land
New battery to thy heart may frame,
Then think this name alive, and that thou thus
In it offend'st my Genius.

IX.

And when thy melted maid,
Corrupted by thy lover's gold and page,
His letter at thy pillow hath laid,
Disputed it, and tamed thy rage,
And thou begin'st to thaw towards him, for this,
May my name step in, and hide his.

X.

And if this treason go
To an overt act and that thou write again,
In superscribing, this name flow
Into thy fancy from the pane ;
So, in forgetting thou rememb'rest right,
And unaware to me shalt write.

XI.

But glass and lines must be
No means our firm substantial love to keep ;
Near death inflicts this lethargy,
And this I murmur in my sleep ;
Inpute this idle talk, to that I go,
For dying men talk often so.

 

Another of the Same

'TIS true, 'tis day ; what though it be?
O, wilt thou therefore rise from me?
Why should we rise because 'tis light?
Did we lie down because 'twas night?
Love, which in spite of darkness brought us hither,
Should in despite of light keep us together.

Light hath no tongue, but is all eye ;
If it could speak as well as spy,
This were the worst that it could say,
That being well I fain would stay,
And that I loved my heart and honour so
That I would not from him, that had them, go.

Must business thee from hence remove?
O ! that's the worst disease of love,
The poor, the foul, the false, love can
Admit, but not the busied man.
He which hath business, and makes love, doth do
Such wrong, as when a married man doth woo.

 

Break of Day

STAY, O sweet, and do not rise ;
The light that shines comes from thine eyes ;
The day breaks not, it is my heart,
Because that you and I must part.
Stay, or else my joys will die,
And perish in their infancy.

 

Community

GOOD we must love, and must hate ill,
For ill is ill, and good good still ;
But there are things indifferent,
Which wee may neither hate, nor love,
But one, and then another prove,
As we shall find our fancy bent.

If then at first wise Nature had
Made women either good or bad,
Then some wee might hate, and some choose ;
But since she did them so create,
That we may neither love, nor hate,
Only this rests, all all may use.

If they were good it would be seen ;
Good is as visible as green,
And to all eyes itself betrays.
If they were bad, they could not last ;
Bad doth itself, and others waste ;
So they deserve nor blame, nor praise.

But they are ours as fruits are ours ;
He that but tastes, he that devours,
And he that leaves all, doth as well ;
Changed loves are but changed sorts of meat ;
And when he hath the kernel eat,
Who doth not fling away the shell?

 

Elegy VIII: The Comparison

AS the sweet sweat of roses in a still,
As that which from chafed musk cat's pores doth trill,
As the almighty balm of th' early east,
Such are the sweat drops of my mistress' breast ;
And on her neck her skin such lustre sets,
They seem no sweat drops, but pearl carcanets.
Rank sweaty froth thy mistress' brow defiles,
Like spermatic issue of ripe menstruous boils,
Or like the scum, which, by need's lawless law
Enforced, Sanserra's starvèd men did draw
From parboil'd shoes and boots, and all the rest
Which were with any sovereign fatness blest ;
And like vile lying stones in saffron'd tin,
Or warts, or wheals, it hangs upon her skin.
Round as the world's her head, on every side,
Like to the fatal ball which fell on Ide ;
Or that whereof God had such jealousy,
As for the ravishing thereof we die.
Thy head is like a rough-hewn statue of jet,
Where marks for eyes, nose, mouth, are yet scarce set ;
Like the first chaos, or flat seeming face
Of Cynthia, when th' earth's shadows her embrace.
Like Proserpine's white beauty-keeping chest,
Or Jove's best fortune's urn, is her fair breast.
Thine's like worm-eaten trunks, clothed in seal's skin,
Or grave, that's dust without, and stink within.
And like that slender stalk, at whose end stands
The woodbine quivering, are her arms and hands.
Like rough-bark'd elm-boughs, or the russet skin
Of men late scourged for madness, or for sin,
Like sun-parch'd quarters on the city gate,
Such is thy tann'd skin's lamentable state ;
And like a bunch of ragged carrots stand
The short swollen fingers of thy gouty hand.
Then like the chemic's masculine equal fire,
Which in the limbec's warm womb doth inspire
Into th' earth's worthless dirt a soul of gold,
Such cherishing heat her best loved part doth hold.
Thine's like the dread mouth of a fired gun,
Or like hot liquid metals newly run
Into clay moulds, or like to that Ætna,
Where round about the grass is burnt away.
Are not your kisses then as filthy, and more,
As a worm sucking an envenom'd sore?
Doth not thy fearful hand in feeling quake,
As one which gathering flowers still fears a snake?
Is not your last act harsh and violent,
As when a plough a stony ground doth rent?
So kiss good turtles, so devoutly nice
Are priests in handling reverent sacrifice,
And such in searching wounds the surgeon is,
As we, when we embrace, or touch, or kiss.
Leave her, and I will leave comparing thus,
She and comparisons are odious.

 

Elegy X: The Dream

IMAGE of her whom I love, more than she,
Whose fair impression in my faithful heart
Makes me her medal, and makes her love me,
As kings do coins, to which their stamps impart
The value ; go, and take my heart from hence,
Which now is grown too great and good for me.
Honours oppress weak spirits, and our sense
Strong objects dull ; the more, the less we see.
When you are gone, and reason gone with you,
Then fantasy is queen and soul, and all ;
She can present joys meaner than you do,
Convenient, and more proportional.
So, if I dream I have you, I have you,
For all our joys are but fantastical ;
And so I 'scape the pain, for pain is true ;
And sleep, which locks up sense, doth lock out all.
After a such fruition I shall wake,
And, but the waking, nothing shall repent ;
And shall to love more thankful sonnets make,
Than if more honour, tears, and pains were spent.
But, dearest heart and dearer image, stay ;
Alas ! true joys at best are dream enough ;
Though you stay here, you pass too fast away,
For even at first life's taper is a snuff.
Fill'd with her love, may I be rather grown
Mad with much heart, than idiot with none.

 

Elegy XIII: His Parting From Her

SINCE she must go, and I must mourn, come night,
Environ me with darkness, whilst I write ;
Shadow that hell unto me, which alone
I am to suffer when my love is gone.
Alas ! the darkest magic cannot do it,
Thou and great hell, to boot, are shadows to it.
Should Cynthia quit thee, Venus, and each star,
It would not form one thought dark as mine are.
I could lend them obscureness now, and say
Out of my self, there should be no more day.
Such is already my self-want of sight,
Did not the fire within me force a light.
O Love, that fire and darkness should be mix'd,
Or to thy triumphs such strange torments fix'd !
Is it because thou thyself art blind, that we,
Thy martyrs, must no more each other see ?
Or takest thou pride to break us on the wheel,
And view old Chaos in the pains we feel ?
Or have we left undone some mutual rite,
That thus with parting thou seek'st us to spite ?
No, no. The fault is mine, impute it to me,
Or rather to conspiring destiny,
Which, since I loved in jest before, decreed
That I should suffer, when I loved indeed ;
And therefore, sooner now than I can say,
I saw the golden fruit, 'tis rapt away ;
Or as I'd watch'd one drop in the vast stream,
And I left wealthy only in a dream.
Yet, Love, thou'rt blinder than myself in this,
To vex my dove-like friend for my amiss ;
And where one sad truth may expiate
Thy wrath, to make her fortune run my fate.
So blinded justice doth, when favourites fall,
Strike them, their house, their friends, their favourites all.
Was't not enough that thou didst dart thy fires
Into our bloods, inflaming our desires,
And madest us sigh, and blow, and pant, and burn,
And then thyself into our flames didst turn ?
Was't not enough that thou didst hazard us
To paths in love so dark and dangerous,
And those so ambush'd round with household spies,
And over all thy husband's towering eyes,
Inflamed with th' ugly sweat of jealousy ;
Yet went we not still on in constancy ?
Have we for this kept guards, like spy on spy ?
Had correspondence whilst the foe stood by ?
Stolen, more to sweeten them, our many blisses
Of meetings, conference, embracements, kisses ?
Shadow'd with negligence our best respects ?
Varied our language through all dialects
Of becks, winks, looks, and often under boards
Spoke dialogues with our feet far from our words ?
Have we proved all the secrets of our art,
Yea, thy pale inwards, and thy panting heart ?
And, after all this passed purgatory,
Must sad divorce make us the vulgar story ?
First let our eyes be riveted quite through
Our turning brain, and both our lips grow to ;
Let our arms clasp like ivy, and our fear
Freeze us together, that we may stick here,
Till Fortune, that would ruin us with the deed,
Strain his eyes open, and yet make them bleed.
For Love it cannot be, whom hitherto
I have accused, should such a mischief do.
O Fortune, thou'rt not worth my least exclaim,
And plague enough thou hast in thy own name.
Do thy great worst ; my friend and I have charms,
Though not against thy strokes, against thy harms.
Rend us in sunder ; thou canst not divide
Our bodies so, but that our souls are tied,
And we can love by letters still and gifts,
And thoughts and dreams ; love never wanteth shifts.
I will not look upon the quickening sun,
But straight her beauty to my sense shall run ;
The air shall note her soft, the fire, most pure ;
Waters suggest her clear, and the earth sure.
Time shall not lose our passages ; the spring,
How fresh our love was in the beginning ;
The summer, how it ripen'd in the year ;
And autumn, what our golden harvests were ;
The winter I'll not think on to spite thee,
But count it a lost season ; so shall she.
And dearest friend, since we must part, drown night
With hope of day—burdens well borne are light— ;
The cold and darkness longer hang somewhere,
Yet Phoebus equally lights all the sphere ;
And what we cannot in like portion pay
The world enjoys in mass, and so we may.
Be then ever yourself, and let no woe
Win on your health, your youth, your beauty ; so
Declare yourself base Fortune's enemy,
No less be your contempt than her inconstancy ;
That I may grow enamour'd on your mind,
When mine own thoughts I here neglected find.
And this to the comfort of my dear I vow,
My deeds shall still be what my deeds are now ;
The poles shall move to teach me ere I start ;
And when I change my love, I'll change my heart.
Nay, if I wax but cold in my desire,
Think, heaven hath motion lost, and the world, fire.
Much more I could, but many words have made
That oft suspected which men most persuade.
Take therefore all in this ; I love so true,
As I will never look for less in you.

 

Elegy XVI: The Expostulation

TO make the doubt clear, that no woman's true,
Was it my fate to prove it strong in you?
Thought I, but one had breathèd purest air ;
And must she needs be false, because she's fair?
Is it your beauty's mark, or of your youth,
Or your perfection, not to study truth?
Or think you heaven is deaf, or hath no eyes?
Or those it hath smile at your perjuries?
Are vows so cheap with women, or the matter
Whereof they're made, that they are writ in water,
And blown away with wind? Or doth their breath
Both hot and cold, at once make life and death?
Who could have thought so many accents sweet
Form'd into words, so may sighs should meet
As from our hearts, so many oaths, and tears
Sprinkled among, all sweeten'd by our fears,
And the divine impression of stolen kisses,
That seal'd the rest, should now prove empty blisses?
Did you draw bonds to forfeit? sign to break?
Or must we read you quite from what you speak,
And find the truth out the wrong way? or must
He first desire you false, would wish you just?
O ! I profane ! though most of women be
This kind of beast, my thoughts shall except thee,
My dearest love ; though froward jealousy
With circumstance might urge thy inconstancy,
Sooner I'll think the sun will cease to cheer
The teeming earth, and that forget to bear ;
Sooner that rivers will run back, or Thames
With ribs of ice in June will bin his streams ;
Or nature, by whose strength the world endures,
Would change her course, before you alter yours.
But O ! that treacherous breast, to whom weak you
Did drift our counsels, and we both may rue,
Having his falsehood found too late ; 'twas he
That made me cast you guilty, and you me ;
Whilst he, black wretch, betray'd each simple word
We spake, unto the cunning of a third.
Cursed may he be, that so our love hath slain,
And wander on the earth, wretched as Cain,
Let all eyes shun him, and he shun each eye,
'Til he be noisome as his infamy ;
May he without remorse deny God thrice,
And not be trusted more on his soul's price ;
And, after all self-torment, when he dies,
May wolves tear out his heart, vultures his eyes,
Swine eat his bowels, and his falser tongue
That utter'd all, be to some raven flung ;
And let his carrion corse be a longer feast
To the king's dogs, than any other beast.
Now have I cursed, let us our love revive ;
In me the flame was never more alive.
I could begin again to court and praise,
And in that pleasure lengthen the short days
Of my life's lease ; like painters that do take
Delight, not in made work, but whiles they make.
I could renew those times, when first I saw
Love in your eyes, that gave my tongue the law
To like what you liked ; and at masks and plays
Commend the self-same actors, the same ways ;
Ask how you did, and often with intent
Of being officious, be impertinent ;
All which were such soft pastimes, as in these
Love was as subtly catch'd as a disease.
But being got, it is a treasure sweet,
Which to defend is harder than to get ;
And ought not be profaned, on either part,
For though 'tis got by chance, 'tis kept by art.

 

Elegy XVIII

THE heavens rejoice in motion ; why should I
Abjure my so much loved variety,
And not with many youth and love divide ?
Pleasure is none, if not diversified.
The sun that, sitting in the chair of light,
Sheds flame into what else so ever doth seem bright,
Is not contented at one sign to inn,
But ends his year, and with a new begin.
All things do willingly in change delight,
The fruitful mother of our appetite ;
Rivers the clearer and more pleasing are,
Where their fair-spreading streams run wide and clear ;
And a dead lake, that no strange bark doth greet,
Corrupts itself, and what doth live in it.
Let no man tell me such a one is fair,
And worthy all alone my love to share.
Nature in her hath done the liberal part
Of a kind mistress, and employed her art,
To make her loveable, and I aver
Him not humane, that would turn back from her.
I love her well, and would, if need were, die,
To do her service. But follows it that I
Must serve her only, when I may have choice ?
The law is hard, and shall not have my voice.
The last I saw in all extremes is fair,
And holds me in the sunbeams of her hair ;
Her nymph-like features such agreements have,
That I could venture with her to the grave.
Another's brown ; I like her not the worse ;
Her tongue is soft and takes me with discourse.
Others, for that they well descended were,
Do in my love obtain as large a share ;
And though they be not fair, 'tis much with me
To win their love only for their degree.
And though I fail of my required ends,
The attempt is glorious and itself commends.
How happy were our sires in ancient time,
Who held plurality of loves no crime.
With them it was accounted charity
To stir up race of all indifferently ;
Kindred were not exempted from the bands,
Which with the Persian still in usage stands.
Women were then no sooner ask'd than won,
And what they did was honest and well done.
But since this little Honour hath been used,
Our weak credulity hath been abused ;
The golden laws of nature are repeal'd,
Which our first fathers in such reverence held ;
Our liberty reversed and charters gone ;
And we made servants to Opinion ;
A monster in no certain shape attired,
And whose original is much desired,
Formless at first, but growing on its fashions,
And doth prescribe manners and laws to nations.
Here love received immedicable harms,
And was despoiled of his daring arms ;
A greater want than is his daring eyes,
He lost those awful wings with which he flies,
His sinewy bow and those immortal darts,
With which he is wont to bruise resisting hearts.
Only some few, strong in themselves and free,
Retain the seeds of ancient liberty,
Following that part of love although depress'd,
Yet make a throne for him within their breast,
In spite of modern censures him avowing
Their sovereign, all service him allowing.
Amongst which troop although I am the least,
Yet equal in perfection with the best,
I glory in subjection of his hand,
Nor ever did decline his least command ;
For in whatever form the message came
My heart did open and receive the same,
But time will in his course a point descry
When I this lovèd service must deny ;
For our allegiance temporary is ;
With firmer age returns our liberties.
What time in years and judgment we reposed,
Shall not so easily be to change disposed,
Nor to the art of several eyes obeying,
But beauty with true worth securely weighing ;
Which being found assembled in some one
We'll leave her ever, and love her alone.

 

Elegy XIX

WHOEVER loves, if he do not propose
The right true end of love, he's one that goes
To sea for nothing but to make him sick.
Love is a bear-whelp born : if we o'er-lick
Our love, and force it new strange shapes to take,
We err, and of a lump a monster make.
Were not a calf a monster, that were grown
Faced like a man, though better than his own ?
Perfection is in unity ; prefer
One woman first, and then one thing in her.
I, when I value gold, may think upon
The ductileness, the application,
The wholesomeness, the ingenuity,
From rust, from soil, from fire ever free ;
But if I love it, 'tis because 'tis made
By our new nature, use, the soul of trade.
All this in women we might think upon,
—If women had them—and yet love but one.
Can men more injure women than to say
They love them for that, by which they're not they ?
Makes virtue woman ? must I cool my blood
Till I both be, and find one wise and good ?
May barren angels love so. But if we
Make love to woman, virtue is not she,
As beauty is not, nor wealth. He that strays thus
From her to hers is more adulterous
Than if he took her maid. Search every sphere
And firmament, our Cupid is not there.
He's an infernal God, and underground
With Pluto dwells, where gold and fire abound.
Men to such gods their sacrificing coals
Did not on altars lay, but pits and holes.
Although we see celestial bodies move
Above the earth, the earth we till and love.
So we her airs contemplate, words and heart,
And virtues, but we love the centric part.
Nor is the soul more worthy, or more fit
For love, than this, as infinite as it.
But in attaining this desired place
How much they err, that set out at the face ?
The hair a forest is of ambushes,
Of springes, snares, fetters, and manacles ;
The brow becalms us when 'tis smooth and plain,
And when 'tis wrinkled, shipwrecks us again ;
Smooth, 'tis a paradise, where we would have
Immortal stay, but wrinkled 'tis a grave.
The nose, like to the first meridian, runs
Not 'twixt an east and west, but 'twixt two suns ;
It leaves a cheek, a rosy hemisphere,
On either side, and then directs us where
Upon the islands fortunate we fall,
Not faint Canaries, but ambrosial,
Her swelling lips, to which when we are come,
We anchor there, and think ourselves at home,
For they seem all ; there Sirens' songs and there
Wise Delphic oracles do fill the ear.
There, in a creek where chosen pearls do swell,
The remora, her cleaving tongue, doth dwell.
These and the glorious promontory, her chin,
O'erpast, and the straight Hellespont between
The Sestos and Abydos of her breasts,
Not of two lovers, but two loves, the nests,
Succeeds a boundless sea, but yet thine eye
Some island moles may scattered there descry ;
And sailing towards her India, in that way
Shall at her fair Atlantic navel stay.
Though there the current be the pilot made,
Yet, ere thou be where thou shouldst be embay'd,
Thou shalt upon another forest set,
Where many shipwreck, and no further get.
When thou art there, consider what this chase
Misspent by thy beginning at the face.
Rather set out below ; practise thy art ;
Some symmetry the foot hath with that part
Which thou dost seek, and is thy map for that,
Lovely enough to stop, but not stay at.
Least subject to disguise and change it is ;
Men say the devil never can change his ;
It is the emblem that hath figured
Firmness ; 'tis the first part that comes to bed.
Civility we see refined ; the kiss,
Which at the face began, transplanted is,
Since to the hand, since to the imperial knee,
Now at the papal foot delights to be.
If kings think that the nearer way, and do
Rise from the foot, lovers may do so too ;
For, as free spheres move faster far than can
Birds, whom the air resists, so may that man
Which goes this empty and ethereal way,
Than if at beauty's elements he stay.
Rich Nature in women wisely made
Two purses, and their mouths aversely laid.
They then which to the lower tribute owe,
That way which that exchequer looks must go ;
He which doth not, his error is as great,
As who by clyster gives the stomach meat.

 

Elegy XX: To His Mistress Going to Bed

COME, madam, come, all rest my powers defy ;
Until I labour, I in labour lie.
The foe ofttimes, having the foe in sight,
Is tired with standing, though he never fight.
Off with that girdle, like heaven's zone glittering,
But a far fairer world encompassing.
Unpin that spangled breast-plate, which you wear,
That th' eyes of busy fools may be stopp'd there.
Unlace yourself, for that harmonious chime
Tells me from you that now it is bed-time.
Off with that happy busk, which I envy,
That still can be, and still can stand so nigh.
Your gown going off such beauteous state reveals,
As when from flowery meads th' hill's shadow steals.
Off with your wiry coronet, and show
The hairy diadems which on you do grow.
Off with your hose and shoes ; then softly tread
In this love's hallow'd temple, this soft bed.
In such white robes heaven's angels used to be
Revealed to men ; thou, angel, bring'st with thee
A heaven-like Mahomet's paradise ; and though
Ill spirits walk in white, we easily know
By this these angels from an evil sprite ;
Those set our hairs, but these our flesh upright.
Licence my roving hands, and let them go
Before, behind, between, above, below.
O, my America, my Newfoundland,
My kingdom, safest when with one man mann'd,
My mine of precious stones, my empery ;
How am I blest in thus discovering thee !
To enter in these bonds, is to be free ;
Then, where my hand is set, my soul shall be.
Full nakedness ! All joys are due to thee ;
As souls unbodied, bodies unclothed must be
To taste whole joys. Gems which you women use
Are like Atlanta's ball cast in men's views ;
That, when a fool's eye lighteth on a gem,
His earthly soul might court that, not them.
Like pictures, or like books' gay coverings made
For laymen, are all women thus array'd.
Themselves are only mystic books, which we
—Whom their imputed grace will dignify—
Must see reveal'd. Then, since that I may know,
As liberally as to thy midwife show
Thyself ; cast all, yea, this white linen hence ;
There is no penance due to innocence :
To teach thee, I am naked first ; why then,
What needst thou have more covering than a man?

 

The Expiration

SO, so, break off this last lamenting kiss,
Which sucks two souls, and vapours both away ;
Turn, thou ghost, that way, and let me turn this,
And let ourselves benight our happiest day.
We ask none leave to love ; nor will we owe
Any so cheap a death as saying, "Go."
Go ; and if that word have not quite killed thee,
Ease me with death, by bidding me go too.
Or, if it have, let my word work on me,
And a just office on a murderer do.
Except it be too late, to kill me so,
Being double dead, going, and bidding, "Go."

 

AN EPITHALAMION, OR MARRIAGE SONG
ON THE LADY ELIZABETH AND COUNT
PALATINE BEING MARRIED ON ST. VAL-
ENTINE'S DAY.

I

HAIL Bishop Valentine, whose day this is ;
All the air is thy diocese,
And all the chirping choristers
And other birds are thy parishioners ;
Thou marriest every year
The lyric lark, and the grave whispering dove,
The sparrow that neglects his life for love,
The household bird with the red stomacher ;
Thou makest the blackbird speed as soon,
As doth the goldfinch, or the halcyon ;
The husband cock looks out, and straight is sped,
And meets his wife, which brings her feather-bed.
This day more cheerfully than ever shine ;
This day, which might enflame thyself, old Valentine.
II.
Till now, thou warmd'st with multiplying loves
Two larks, two sparrows, or two doves ;
All that is nothing unto this ;
For thou this day couplest two phoenixes ;
Thou makst a taper see
What the sun never saw, and what the ark
—Which was of fouls and beasts the cage and park—
Did not contain, one bed contains, through thee ;
Two phoenixes, whose joined breasts
Are unto one another mutual nests,
Where motion kindles such fires as shall give
Young phoenixes, and yet the old shall live ;
Whose love and courage never shall decline,
But make the whole year through, thy day, O Valentine.

III.
Up then, fair phoenix bride, frustrate the sun ;
Thyself from thine affection
Takest warmth enough, and from thine eye
All lesser birds will take their jollity.
Up, up, fair bride, and call
Thy stars from out their several boxes, take
Thy rubies, pearls, and diamonds forth, and make
Thyself a constellation of them all ;
And by their blazing signify
That a great princess falls, but doth not die.
Be thou a new star, that to us portends
Ends of much wonder ; and be thou those ends.
Since thou dost this day in new glory shine,
May all men date records from this day, Valentine.

IV.
Come forth, come forth, and as one glorious flame
Meeting another grows the same,
So meet thy Frederick, and so
To an inseparable union go,
Since separation
Falls not on such things as are infinite,
Nor things, which are but one, can disunite.
You're twice inseparable, great, and one ;
Go then to where the bishop stays,
To make you one, his way, which divers ways
Must be effected ; and when all is past,
And that you're one, by hearts and hands made fast,
You two have one way left, yourselves to entwine,
Besides this bishop's knot, of Bishop Valentine.

V.
But O, what ails the sun, that here he stays,
Longer to-day than other days ?
Stays he new light from these to get ?
And finding here such stars, is loth to set ?
And why do you two walk,
So slowly paced in this procession ?
Is all your care but to be look'd upon,
And be to others spectacle, and talk ?
The feast with gluttonous delays
Is eaten, and too long their meat they praise ;
The masquers come late, and I think, will stay,
Like fairies, till the cock crow them away.
Alas ! did not antiquity assign
A night as well as day, to thee, old Valentine ?

VI.
They did, and night is come ; and yet we see
Formalities retarding thee.
What mean these ladies, which—as though
They were to take a clock in pieces—go
So nicely about the bride ?
A bride, before a “ Good-night” could be said,
Should vanish from her clothes into her bed,
As souls from bodies steal, and are not spied.
But now she's laid ; what though she be ?
Yet there are more delays, for where is he ?
He comes and passeth through sphere after sphere ;
First her sheets, then her arms, then anywhere.
Let not this day, then, but this night be thine ;
Thy day was but the eve to this, O Valentine.

VII.
Here lies a she sun, and a he moon there ;
She gives the best light to his sphere ;
Or each is both, and all, and so
They unto one another nothing owe ;
And yet they do, but are
So just and rich in that coin which they pay,
That neither would, nor needs forbear, nor stay ;
Neither desires to be spared nor to spare.
They quickly pay their debt, and then
Take no acquittances, but pay again ;
They pay, they give, they lend, and so let fall
No such occasion to be liberal.
More truth, more courage in these two do shine,
Than all thy turtles have and sparrows, Valentine.

VIII.
And by this act these two phoenixes
Nature again restorèd is ;
For since these two are two no more,
There's but one phoenix still, as was before.
Rest now at last, and we—
As satyrs watch the sun's uprise—will stay
Waiting when your eyes opened let out day,
Only desired because your face we see.
Others near you shall whispering speak,
And wagers lay, at which side day will break,
And win by observing, then, whose hand it is
That opens first a curtain, hers or his :
This will be tried to-morrow after nine,
Till which hour, we thy day enlarge, O Valentine.

 

EPITHALAMION MADE AT LINCOLN'S INN.

I

HAIL sun-beams in the east are spread ;
Leave, leave, fair bride, your solitary bed ;
No more shall you return to it alone ;
It nurseth sadness, and your body's print,
Like to a grave, the yielding down doth dint ;
You, and your other you, meet there anon.
Put forth, put forth, that warm balm-breathing thigh,
Which when next time you in these sheets will smother,
There it must meet another,
Which never was, but must be, oft, more nigh.
Come glad from thence, go gladder than you came ;
To-day put on perfection, and a woman's name.
Daughters of London, you which be
Our golden mines, and furnish'd treasury ;
You which are angels, yet still bring with you
Thousands of angels on your marriage days ;
Help with your presence, and devise to praise
These rites, which also unto you grow due ;
Conceitedly dress her, and be assign'd,
By you fit place for every flower and jewel ;
Make her for love fit fuel,
As gay as Flora and as rich as Ind ;
So may she, fair and rich in nothing lame,
To-day put on perfection, and a woman's name.

And you frolic patricians,
Sons of those senators, wealth's deep oceans ;
Ye painted courtiers, barrels of other's wits ;
Ye countrymen, who but your beasts love none ;
Ye of those fellowships, whereof he's one,
Of study and play made strange hermaphrodites,
Here shine ; this bridegroom to the temple bring.
Lo, in yon path which store of strew'd flowers graceth,
The sober virgin paceth ;
Except my sight fail, 'tis no other thing.
Weep not, nor blush, here is no grief nor shame,
To-day put on perfection, and a woman's name.

Thy two-leaved gates, fair temple, unfold,
And these two in thy sacred bosom hold,
Till mystically join'd but one they be ;
Then may thy lean and hunger-starvèd womb
Long time expect their bodies, and their tomb,
Long after their own parents fatten thee.
All elder claims, and all cold barrenness,
All yielding to new loves, be far for ever,
Which might these two dissever ;
Always, all th'other may each one possess ;
For the best bride, best worthy of praise and fame,
To-day puts on perfection, and a woman's name.

Winter days bring much delight,
Not for themselves, but for they soon bring night ;
Other sweets wait thee than these diverse meats,
Other disports than dancing jollities,
Other love-tricks than glancing with the eyes,
But that the sun still in our half sphere sweats ;
He flies in winter, but he now stands still.
Yet shadows turn ; noon point he hath attain'd ;
His steeds will be restrain'd,
But gallop lively down the western hill.
Thou shalt, when he hath run the heaven's half frame,
To-night put on perfection, and a woman's name.

The amorous evening star is rose,
Why then should not our amorous star inclose
Herself in her wish'd bed ? Release your strings,
Musicians ; and dancers take some truce
With these your pleasing labours, for great use
As much weariness as perfection brings.
You, and not only you, but all toil'd beasts
Rest duly ; at night all their toils are dispensed ;
But in their beds commenced
Are other labours, and more dainty feasts.
She goes a maid, who, lest she turn the same,
To-night puts on perfection, and a woman's name.

Thy virgin's girdle now untie,
And in thy nuptial bed, love's altar, lie
A pleasing sacrifice ; now dispossess
Thee of these chains and robes, which were put on
To adorn the day, not thee ; for thou, alone,
Like virtue and truth, art best in nakedness.
This bed is only to virginity
A grave, but to a better state, a cradle.
Till now thou wast but able
To be, what now thou art ; then, that by thee
No more be said, “ I may be,” but, “ I am,”
To-night put on perfection, and a woman's name.

Even like a faithful man content,
That this life for a better should be spent,
So she a mother's rich stile doth prefer,
And at the bridegroom's wish'd approach doth lie,
Like an appointed lamb, when tenderly
The priest comes on his knees to embowel her.
Now sleep or watch with more joy ; and, O light
Of heaven, to-morrow rise thou hot, and early ;
This sun will love so dearly
Her rest, that long, long we shall want her sight.
Wonders are wrought, for she, which had no maim,
To-night puts on perfection, and a woman's name.

 

ECLOGUE.
I6I3, DECEMBER 26.

ALLOPHANES FINDING IDIOS IN THE COUNTRY IN
CHRISTMAS TIME, REPREHENDS HIS ABSENCE
FROM COURT, AT THE MARRIAGE OF THE EARL
OF SOMERSET ; IDIOS GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF
HIS PURPOSE THEREIN, AND OF HIS ACTIONS
THERE.

ALLOPHANES.
UNSEASONABLE man, statue of ice,
What could to countries solitude entice
Thee, in this year's cold and decrepit time ?
Nature's instinct draws to the warmer clime
Even smaller birds, who by that courage dare
In numerous fleets sail through their sea, the air.
What delicacy can in fields appear,
Whilst Flora herself doth a frieze jerkin wear ?
Whilst winds do all the trees and hedges strip
Of leaves, to furnish rods enough to whip
Thy madness from thee, and all springs by frost
Have taken cold, and their sweet murmurs lost?
If thou thy faults or fortunes wouldst lament
With just solemnity, do it in Lent.
At court the spring already advanced is,
The sun stays longer up ; and yet not his
The glory is ; far other, other fires.
First, zeal to prince and state, then love's desires
Burn in one breast, and like heaven's two great lights,
The first doth govern days, the other, nights.
And then that early light which did appear
Before the sun and moon created were,
The princes favour is diffused o'er all,
From which all fortunes, names, and natures fall.
Then from those wombs of stars, the bride's bright eyes,
At every glance, a constellation flies,
And sows the court with stars, and doth prevent
In light and power, the all-eyed firmament.
First her eyes kindle other ladies' eyes,
Then from their beams their jewels' lustres rise,
And from their jewels torches do take fire,
And all is warmth, and light, and good desire.
Most other courts, alas ! are like to hell,
Where in dark places, fire without light doth dwell ;
Or but like stoves ; for lust and envy get
Continual, but artificial heat.
Here zeal and love grown one all clouds digest,
And make our court an everlasting east.
And canst thou be from thence ?

IDIOS. No, I am there ;
As heaven—to men disposed—is everywhere,
So are those courts, whose princes animate
Not only all their house but all their state.
Let no man think, because he's full, he hath all.
Kings—as their pattern, God—are liberal
Not only in fullness, but capacity,
Enlarging narrow men to feel and see,
And comprehend the blessings they bestow.
So, reclused hermits oftentimes do know
More of heaven's glory than a worldling can.
As man is of the world, the heart of man
Is an epitome of God's great book
Of creatures, and man need no farther look ;
So is the country of courts, where sweet peace doth,
As their one common soul, give life to both ;
And am I then from court ?

ALLOPHANES. Dreamer, thou art :
Think'st thou, fantastic, that thou hast a part
In the Indian fleet, because thou hast
A little spice or amber in thy taste ?
Because thou art not frozen, art thou warm ?
Seest thou all good, because thou seest no harm ?
The earth doth in her inner bowels hold
Stuff well-disposed, and which would fain be gold ;
But never shall, except it chance to lie
So upward, that heaven gild it with his eye.
As, for divine things, faith comes from above,
So, for best civil use, all tinctures move
From higher powers ; from God religion springs,
Wisdom and honour from the use of kings :
Then unbeguile thyself, and know with me,
That angels, though on earth employ'd they be,
Are still in heaven, so is he still at home
That doth abroad to honest actions come.
Chide thyself then, O fool, which yesterday
Mightst have read more than all thy books bewray ;
Hast thou a history, which doth present
A court, where all affections do assent
Unto the king's, and that that king's are just ;
And where it is no levity to trust ;
Where there is no ambition, but to obey ;
Where men need whisper nothing, and yet may ;
Where the king's favours are so placed, that all
Find that the king therein is liberal
To them, in him, because his favours bend
To virtue, to the which they all pretend ?
Thou hast no such ; yet here was this, and more.
An earnest lover, wise then, and before,
Our little Cupid hath sued livery,
And is no more in his minority ;
He is admitted now into that breast
Where the king's counsels and his secrets rest.
What hast thou lost, O ignorant man ?

IDIOS. I knew
All this, and only therefore I withdrew.
To know and feel all this, and not to have
Words to express it, makes a man a grave
Of his own thoughts ; I would not therefore stay
At a great feast, having no grace to say.
And yet I 'scaped not here ; for being come
Full of the common joy, I utter'd some.
Read then this nuptial song, which was not made
Either the court or men's hearts to invade ;
But since I am dead and buried, I could frame
No epitaph, which might advance my fame
So much as this poor song, which testifies
I did unto that day some sacrifice.

I. THE TIME OF THE MARRIAGE.

Thou art reprieved, old year, thou shalt not die ;
Though thou upon thy death-bed lie,
And should'st within five days expire,
Yet thou art rescued by a mightier fire,
Than thy old soul, the sun,
When he doth in his largest circle run.
The passage of the west or east would thaw,
And open wide their easy liquid jaw
To all our ships, could a Promethean art
Either unto the northern pole impart
The fire of these inflaming eyes, or of this loving
heart.

II.

EQUALITY OF PERSONS.

But undiscerning Muse, which heart, which eyes,
In this new couple, dost thou prize,
When his eye as inflaming is
As hers, and her heart loves as well as his ?
Be tried by beauty, and then
The bridegroom is a maid, and not a man ;
If by that manly courage they be tried,
Which scorns unjust opinion ; then the bride
Becomes a man. Should chance or envy's art
Divide these two, whom nature scarce did part,
Since both have the inflaming eye, and both the
loving heart?

III.

RAISING OF THE BRIDEGROOM.

Though it be some divorce to think of you
Single, so much one are you two,
Let me here contemplate thee,
First, cheerful bridegroom, and first let me see,
How thou prevent'st the sun,
And his red foaming horses dost outrun ;
How, having laid down in thy Sovereign's breast
All businesses, from thence to reinvest
Them when these triumphs cease, thou forward art
To show to her, who doth the like impart,
The fire of thy inflaming eyes, and of thy loving heart.

IV.

RAISING OF THE BRIDE.

But now to thee, fair bride, it is some wrong,
To think thou wert in bed so long.
Since soon thou liest down first, 'tis fit
Thou in first rising shouldst allow for it.
Powder thy radiant hair,
Which if without such ashes thou wouldst wear,
Thou which, to all which come to look upon,
Wert meant for Phoebus, wouldst be Phaëton.
For our ease, give thine eyes th' unusual part
Of joy, a tear ; so quench'd, thou mayst impart,
To us that come, thy inflaming eyes ; to him, thy
loving heart.

V.

HER APPARELLING.

Thus thou descend'st to our infirmity,
Who can the sun in water see.
So dost thou, when in silk and gold
Thou cloud'st thyself ; since we which do behold
Are dust and worms, 'tis just,
Our objects be the fruits of worms and dust.
Let every jewel be a glorious star,
Yet stars are not so pure as their spheres are ;
And though thou stoop, to appear to us, in part,
Still in that picture thou entirely art,
Which thy inflaming eyes have made within his
loving heart.

VI.

GOING TO THE CHAPEL.

Now from your easts you issue forth, and we,
As men, which through a cypress see
The rising sun, do think it two ;
So, as you go to church, do think of you ;
But that veil being gone,
By the church rites you are from thenceforth one.
The church triumphant made this match before,
And now the militant doth strive no more.
Then, reverend priest, who God's Recorder art,
Do, from his dictates, to these two impart
All blessings which are seen, or thought, by angel's
eye or heart.

VII.

THE BENEDICTION.

Blest pair of swans, O may you interbring
Daily new joys, and never sing ;
Live, till all grounds of wishes fail,
Till honour, yea, till wisdom grow so stale,
That new great heights to try,
I must serve your ambition, to die ;
Raise heirs, and may here, to the world's end, live
Heirs from this king, to take thanks, you, to give.
Nature and grace do all, and nothing art ;
May never age or error overthwart
With any west these radiant eyes, with any north
this heart.

VIII.

FEASTS AND REVELS.

But you are over-blest. Plenty this day
Injures ; it causeth time to stay ;
The tables groan, as though this feast
Would, as the flood, destroy all fowl and beast.
And were the doctrine new
That the earth moved, this day would make it true ;
For every part to dance and revel goes,
They tread the air, and fall not where they rose.
Though six hours since the sun to bed did part,
The masks and banquets will not yet impart
A sunset to these weary eyes, a centre to this heart.

IX.

THE BRIDE'S GOING TO BED.

What mean'st thou, bride, this company to keep ?
To sit up, till thou fain wouldst sleep ?
Thou mayst not, when thou'rt laid, do so ;
Thyself must to him a new banquet grow ;
And you must entertain
And do all this day's dances o'er again.
Know that if sun and moon together do
Rise in one point, they do not set so too.
Therefore thou mayst, fair bride, to bed depart ;
Thou art not gone, being gone ; where'er thou art,
Thou leavest in him thy watchful eyes, in him thy
loving heart.

X.

THE BRIDEGROOM'S COMING.

As he that sees a star fall, runs apace,
And finds a jelly in the place,
So doth the bridegroom haste as much,
Being told this star is fallen, and finds her such.
And as friends may look strange,
By a new fashion, or apparel's change,
Their souls, though long acquainted they had been,
These clothes, their bodies, never yet had seen.
Therefore at first she modestly might start,
But must forthwith surrender every part,
As freely as each to each before gave either eye or
heart.

XI.

THE GOOD-NIGHT.

Now, as in Tullia's tomb, one lamp burnt clear,
Unchanged for fifteen hundred year,
May these love-lamps we here enshrine,
In warmth, light, lasting, equal the divine.
Fire ever doth aspire,
And makes all like itself, turns all to fire,
But ends in ashes ; which these cannot do,
For none of these is fuel, but fire too.
This is joy's bonfire, then, where love's strong arts
Make of so noble individual parts
One fire of four inflaming eyes, and of two loving hearts.

IDIOS. As I have brought this song, that I may do
A perfect sacrifice, I'll burn it too.

ALLOPHANES. No, sir. This paper I have justly got,
For, in burnt incense, the perfume is not
His only that presents it, but of all ;
Whatever celebrates this festival
Is common, since the joy thereof is so.
Nor may yourself be priest ; but let me go
Back to the court, and I will lay it upon
Such altars, as prize your devotion.

 

Farewell to Love

WHILST yet to prove
I thought there was some deity in love,
So did I reverence, and gave
Worship ; as atheists at their dying hour
Call, what they cannot name, an unknown power,
As ignorantly did I crave.
Thus when
Things not yet known are coveted by men,
Our desires give them fashion, and so
As they wax lesser, fall, as they size, grow.

But, from late fair,
His highness sitting in a golden chair,
Is not less cared for after three days
By children, than the thing which lovers so
Blindly admire, and with such worship woo ;
Being had, enjoying it decays ;
And thence,
What before pleased them all, takes but one sense,
And that so lamely, as it leaves behind
A kind of sorrowing dulness to the mind.

Ah cannot we,
As well as cocks and lions, jocund be
After such pleasures, unless wise
Nature decreed—since each such act, they say,
Diminisheth the length of life a day—
This ; as she would man should despise
The sport,
Because that other curse of being short,
And only for a minute made to be
Eager, desires to raise posterity.

Since so, my mind
Shall not desire what no man else can find ;
I'll no more dote and run
To pursue things which had endamaged me ;
And when I come where moving beauties be,
As men do when the summer's sun
Grows great,
Though I admire their greatness, shun their heat.
Each place can afford shadows ; if all fail,
'Tis but applying worm-seed to the tail.

 

The Flea

MARK but this flea, and mark in this,
How little that which thou deniest me is ;
It suck'd me first, and now sucks thee,
And in this flea our two bloods mingled be.
Thou know'st that this cannot be said
A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead ;
Yet this enjoys before it woo,
And pamper'd swells with one blood made of two ;
And this, alas ! is more than we would do.

O stay, three lives in one flea spare,
Where we almost, yea, more than married are.
This flea is you and I, and this
Our marriage bed, and marriage temple is.
Though parents grudge, and you, we're met,
And cloister'd in these living walls of jet.
Though use make you apt to kill me,
Let not to that self-murder added be,
And sacrilege, three sins in killing three.

Cruel and sudden, hast thou since
Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence?
Wherein could this flea guilty be,
Except in that drop which it suck'd from thee?
Yet thou triumph'st, and say'st that thou
Find'st not thyself nor me the weaker now.
'Tis true ; then learn how false fears be ;
Just so much honour, when thou yield'st to me,
Will waste, as this flea's death took life from thee.

 

The Good-Morrow

I WONDER by my troth, what thou and I
Did, till we loved ? were we not wean'd till then ?
But suck'd on country pleasures, childishly ?
Or snorted we in the Seven Sleepers' den ?
'Twas so ; but this, all pleasures fancies be ;
If ever any beauty I did see,
Which I desired, and got, 'twas but a dream of thee.

And now good-morrow to our waking souls,
Which watch not one another out of fear ;
For love all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room an everywhere.
Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone ;
Let maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown ;
Let us possess one world ; each hath one, and is one.

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,
And true plain hearts do in the faces rest ;
Where can we find two better hemispheres
Without sharp north, without declining west ?
Whatever dies, was not mix'd equally ;
If our two loves be one, or thou and I
Love so alike that none can slacken, none can die.

 

The Paradox

NO lover saith, I love, nor any other
Can judge a perfect lover ;
He thinks that else none can or will agree,
That any loves but he ;
I cannot say I loved, for who can say
He was kill'd yesterday.
Love with excess of heat, more young than old,
Death kills with too much cold ;
We die but once, and who loved last did die,
He that saith, twice, doth lie ;
For though he seem to move, and stir a while,
It doth the sense beguile.
Such life is like the light which bideth yet
When the life's light is set,
Or like the heat which fire in solid matter
Leaves behind, two hours after.
Once I loved and died ; and am now become
Mine epitaph and tomb ;
Here dead men speak their last, and so do I ;
Love-slain, lo ! here I die.

 

The Token

SEND me some tokens, that my hope may live
Or that my easeless thoughts may sleep and rest ;
Send me some honey, to make sweet my hive,
That in my passions I may hope the best.
I beg nor ribbon wrought with thine own hands,
To knit our loves in the fantastic strain
Of new-touch'd youth ; nor ring to show the stands
Of our affection, that, as that's round and plain,
So should our loves meet in simplicity ;
No, nor the corals, which thy wrist enfold,
Laced up together in congruity,
To show our thoughts should rest in the same hold ;
No, nor thy picture, though most gracious,
And most desired, 'cause 'tis like the best
Nor witty lines, which are most copious,
Within the writings which thou hast address'd.
Send me nor this nor that, to increase my score,
But swear thou think'st I love thee, and no more.

 

The Undertaking

I HAVE done one braver thing
Than all the Worthies did ;
And yet a braver thence doth spring,
Which is, to keep that hid.

It were but madness now to impart
The skill of specular stone,
When he, which can have learn'd the art
To cut it, can find none.

So, if I now should utter this,
Others—because no more
Such stuff to work upon, there is—
Would love but as before.

But he who loveliness within
Hath found, all outward loathes,
For he who color loves, and skin,
Loves but their oldest clothes.

If, as I have, you also do
Virtue in woman see,
And dare love that, and say so too,
And forget the He and She ;

And if this love, though placèd so,
From profane men you hide,
Which will no faith on this bestow,
Or, if they do, deride ;

Then you have done a braver thing
Than all the Worthies did ;
And a braver thence will spring,
Which is, to keep that hid.

 

The Will

BEFORE I sigh my last gasp, let me breathe,
Great Love, some legacies ; I here bequeath
Mine eyes to Argus, if mine eyes can see ;
If they be blind, then, Love, I give them thee ;
My tongue to Fame ; to ambassadors mine ears ;
To women, or the sea, my tears ;
Thou, Love, hast taught me heretofore
By making me serve her who had twenty more,
That I should give to none, but such as had too much before.

My constancy I to the planets give ;
My truth to them who at the court do live ;
My ingenuity and openness,
To Jesuits ; to buffoons my pensiveness ;
My silence to any, who abroad hath been ;
My money to a Capuchin :
Thou, Love, taught'st me, by appointing me
To love there, where no love received can be,
Only to give to such as have an incapacity.

My faith I give to Roman Catholics ;
All my good works unto the Schismatics
Of Amsterdam ; my best civility
And courtship to an University ;
My modesty I give to soldiers bare ;
My patience let gamesters share :
Thou, Love, taught'st me, by making me
Love her that holds my love disparity,
Only to give to those that count my gifts indignity.

I give my reputation to those
Which were my friends ; mine industry to foes ;
To schoolmen I bequeath my doubtfulness ;
My sickness to physicians, or excess ;
To nature all that I in rhyme have writ ;
And to my company my wit :
Thou, Love, by making me adore
Her, who begot this love in me before,
Taught'st me to make, as though I gave, when I do but restore.

To him for whom the passing-bell next tolls,
I give my physic books ; my written rolls
Of moral counsels I to Bedlam give ;
My brazen medals unto them which live
In want of bread ; to them which pass among
All foreigners, mine English tongue :
Though, Love, by making me love one
Who thinks her friendship a fit portion
For younger lovers, dost my gifts thus disproportion.

Therefore I'll give no more, but I'll undo
The world by dying, because love dies too.
Then all your beauties will be no more worth
Than gold in mines, where none doth draw it forth ;
And all your graces no more use shall have,
Than a sun-dial in a grave :
Thou, Love, taught'st me by making me
Love her who doth neglect both me and thee,
To invent, and practise this one way, to annihilate all three.

 

Love's Alchemy

1 Some that have deeper digg'd love's mine than I,
2 Say, where his centric happiness doth lie;
3 I have lov'd, and got, and told,
4 But should I love, get, tell, till I were old,
5 I should not find that hidden mystery.
6 Oh, 'tis imposture all!
7 And as no chemic yet th'elixir got,
8 But glorifies his pregnant pot
9 If by the way to him befall
10 Some odoriferous thing, or medicinal,
11 So, lovers dream a rich and long delight,
12 But get a winter-seeming summer's night.

13 Our ease, our thrift, our honour, and our day,
14 Shall we for this vain bubble's shadow pay?
15 Ends love in this, that my man
16 Can be as happy'as I can, if he can
17 Endure the short scorn of a bridegroom's play?
18 That loving wretch that swears
19 'Tis not the bodies marry, but the minds,
20 Which he in her angelic finds,
21 Would swear as justly that he hears,
22 In that day's rude hoarse minstrelsy, the spheres.
23 Hope not for mind in women; at their best
24 Sweetness and wit, they'are but mummy, possess'd.

 

Love's Deity

1 I long to talk with some old lover's ghost,
2 Who died before the god of love was born.
3 I cannot think that he, who then lov'd most,
4 Sunk so low as to love one which did scorn.
5 But since this god produc'd a destiny,
6 And that vice-nature, custom, lets it be,
7 I must love her, that loves not me.

8 Sure, they which made him god, meant not so much,
9 Nor he in his young godhead practis'd it.
10 But when an even flame two hearts did touch,
11 His office was indulgently to fit
12 Actives to passives. Correspondency
13 Only his subject was; it cannot be
14 Love, till I love her, that loves me.

15 But every modern god will now extend
16 His vast prerogative as far as Jove.
17 To rage, to lust, to write to, to commend,
18 All is the purlieu of the god of love.
19 O! were we waken'd by this tyranny
20 To ungod this child again, it could not be
21 I should love her, who loves not me.

22 Rebel and atheist too, why murmur I,
23 As though I felt the worst that love could do?
24 Love might make me leave loving, or might try
25 A deeper plague, to make her love me too;
26 Which, since she loves before, I'am loth to see.
27 Falsehood is worse than hate; and that must be,
28 If she whom I love, should love me.

 

Love's Usury

FOR every hour that thou wilt spare me now,
I will allow,
Usurious god of love, twenty to thee,
When with my brown my gray hairs equal be.
Till then, Love, let my body range, and let
Me travel, sojourn, snatch, plot, have, forget,
Resume my last year's relict ; think that yet
We'd never met.
Let me think any rival's letter mine,
And at next nine
Keep midnight's promise ; mistake by the way
The maid, and tell the lady of that delay ;
Only let me love none ; no, not the sport
From country grass to confitures of court,
Or city's quelque-choses ; let not report
My mind transport.

This bargain's good ; if when I'm old, I be
Inflamed by thee,
If thine own honour, or my shame and pain,
Thou covet most, at that age thou shalt gain.
Do thy will then ; then subject and degree
And fruit of love, Love, I submit to thee.
Spare me till then ; I'll bear it, though she be
One that love me.

 

Love's War

TILL I have peace with thee, warr other Men,
And when I have peace, can I leave thee then?
All other Warrs are scrupulous; Only thou
0 fayr free Citty, maist thyselfe allow
To any one: In Flanders, who can tell
Whether the Master presse; or men rebell?
Only we know, that which all Ideots say,
They beare most blows which come to part the fray.
France in her lunatique giddines did hate
Ever our men, yea and our God of late;
Yet she relyes upon our Angels well,
Which nere returne; no more than they which fell.
Sick Ireland is with a strange warr possest
Like to an Ague; now raging, now at rest;
Which time will cure: yet it must doe her good
If she were purg'd, and her head vayne let blood.
And Midas joyes our Spanish journeys give,
We touch all gold, but find no food to live.
And I should be in the hott parching clime,
To dust and ashes turn'd before my time.
To mew me in a Ship, is to inthrall
Mee in a prison, that weare like to fall;
Or in a Cloyster; save that there men dwell
In a calme heaven, here in a swaggering hell.
Long voyages are long consumptions,
And ships are carts for executions.
Yea they are Deaths; Is't not all one to flye
Into an other World, as t'is to dye?
Here lett mee warr; in these armes lett mee lye;
Here lett mee parle, batter, bleede, and dye.
Thyne armes imprison me, and myne armes thee,
Thy hart thy ransome is, take myne for mee.
Other men war that they their rest may gayne;
But wee will rest that wee may fight agayne.
Those warrs the ignorant, these th'experienc'd love,
There wee are alwayes under, here above.
There Engins farr off breed a just true feare,
Neere thrusts, pikes, stabs, yea bullets hurt not here.
There lyes are wrongs; here safe uprightly ly;
Tltere men kill men, we'will make one by and by,
Thou nothing; I not halfe so much shall do
In these Warrs, as they may which from us two
Shall spring. Thousands wee see which travaile not
To warrs; But stay swords, armes, and shott
To make at home; And shall not I do then
More glorious service, staying to make men?

 

Lovers' Infiniteness

1 If yet I have not all thy love,
2 Dear, I shall never have it all;
3 I cannot breathe one other sigh, to move,
4 Nor can intreat one other tear to fall;
5 And all my treasure, which should purchase thee--
6 Sighs, tears, and oaths, and letters--I have spent.
7 Yet no more can be due to me,
8 Than at the bargain made was meant;
9 If then thy gift of love were partial,
10 That some to me, some should to others fall,
11 Dear, I shall never have thee all.

12 Or if then thou gavest me all,
13 All was but all, which thou hadst then;
14 But if in thy heart, since, there be or shall
15 New love created be, by other men,
16 Which have their stocks entire, and can in tears,
17 In sighs, in oaths, and letters, outbid me,
18 This new love may beget new fears,
19 For this love was not vow'd by thee.
20 And yet it was, thy gift being general;
21 The ground, thy heart, is mine; whatever shall
22 Grow there, dear, I should have it all.

23 Yet I would not have all yet,
24 He that hath all can have no more;
25 And since my love doth every day admit
26 New growth, thou shouldst have new rewards in store;
27 Thou canst not every day give me thy heart,
28 If thou canst give it, then thou never gavest it;
29 Love's riddles are, that though thy heart depart,
30 It stays at home, and thou with losing savest it;
31 But we will have a way more liberal,
32 Than changing hearts, to join them; so we shall
33 Be one, and one another's all.

 

The Relic

1 When my grave is broke up again
2 Some second guest to entertain,
3 (For graves have learn'd that woman head,
4 To be to more than one a bed)
5 And he that digs it, spies
6 A bracelet of bright hair about the bone,
7 Will he not let'us alone,
8 And think that there a loving couple lies,
9 Who thought that this device might be some way
10 To make their souls, at the last busy day,
11 Meet at this grave, and make a little stay?

12 If this fall in a time, or land,
13 Where mis-devotion doth command,
14 Then he, that digs us up, will bring
15 Us to the bishop, and the king,
16 To make us relics; then
17 Thou shalt be a Mary Magdalen, and I
18 A something else thereby;
19 All women shall adore us, and some men;
20 And since at such time miracles are sought,
21 I would have that age by this paper taught
22 What miracles we harmless lovers wrought.

23 First, we lov'd well and faithfully,
24 Yet knew not what we lov'd, nor why;
25 Difference of sex no more we knew
26 Than our guardian angels do;
27 Coming and going, we
28 Perchance might kiss, but not between those meals;
29 Our hands ne'er touch'd the seals
30 Which nature, injur'd by late law, sets free;
31 These miracles we did, but now alas,
32 All measure, and all language, I should pass,
33 Should I tell what a miracle she was.

 

Go and Catch a Falling Star

1 Go and catch a falling star,
2 Get with child a mandrake root,
3 Tell me where all past years are,
4 Or who cleft the devil's foot,
5 Teach me to hear mermaids singing,
6 Or to keep off envy's stinging,
7 And find
8 What wind
9 Serves to advance an honest mind.

10 If thou be'st born to strange sights,
11 Things invisible to see,
12 Ride ten thousand days and nights,
13 Till age snow white hairs on thee,
14 Thou, when thou return'st, wilt tell me,
15 All strange wonders that befell thee,
16 And swear,
17 No where
18 Lives a woman true, and fair.

19 If thou find'st one, let me know,
20 Such a pilgrimage were sweet;
21 Yet do not, I would not go,
22 Though at next door we might meet;
23 Though she were true, when you met her,
24 And last, till you write your letter,
25 Yet she
26 Will be
27 False, ere I come, to two, or three.

 

Sweetest Love, I Do Not Go

1 Sweetest love, I do not go,
2 For weariness of thee,
3 Nor in hope the world can show
4 A fitter love for me;
5 But since that I
6 Must die at last, 'tis best
7 To use myself in jest
8 Thus by feign'd deaths to die.

9 Yesternight the sun went hence,
10 And yet is here today;
11 He hath no desire nor sense,
12 Nor half so short a way:
13 Then fear not me,
14 But believe that I shall make
15 Speedier journeys, since I take
16 More wings and spurs than he.

17 O how feeble is man's power,
18 That if good fortune fall,
19 Cannot add another hour,
20 Nor a lost hour recall!
21 But come bad chance,
22 And we join to'it our strength,
23 And we teach it art and length,
24 Itself o'er us to'advance.

25 When thou sigh'st, thou sigh'st not wind,
26 But sigh'st my soul away;
27 When thou weep'st, unkindly kind,
28 My life's blood doth decay.
29 It cannot be
30 That thou lov'st me, as thou say'st,
31 If in thine my life thou waste,
32 That art the best of me.

33 Let not thy divining heart
34 Forethink me any ill;
35 Destiny may take thy part,
36 And may thy fears fulfil;
37 But think that we
38 Are but turn'd aside to sleep;
39 They who one another keep
40 Alive, ne'er parted be.

 

The Sun Rising

1 Busy old fool, unruly Sun,
2 Why dost thou thus,
3 Through windows, and through curtains, call on us?
4 Must to thy motions lovers' seasons run?
5 Saucy pedantic wretch, go chide
6 Late schoolboys, and sour prentices,
7 Go tell court-huntsmen that the king will ride,
8 Call country ants to harvest offices,
9 Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime,
10 Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.

11 Thy beams, so reverend and strong
12 Why shouldst thou think?
13 I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink,
14 But that I would not lose her sight so long:
15 If her eyes have not blinded thine,
16 Look, and tomorrow late, tell me
17 Whether both the'Indias of spice and mine
18 Be where thou leftst them, or lie here with me.
19 Ask for those kings whom thou saw'st yesterday,
20 And thou shalt hear: "All here in one bed lay."

21 She'is all states, and all princes I,
22 Nothing else is.
23 Princes do but play us; compar'd to this,
24 All honour's mimic, all wealth alchemy.
25 Thou, sun, art half as happy'as we,
26 In that the world's contracted thus;
27 Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
28 To warm the world, that's done in warming us.
29 Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere;
30 This bed thy centre is, these walls, thy sphere.

 

The Triple Fool

1 I am two fools, I know,
2 For loving, and for saying so
3 In whining poetry;
4 But where's that wiseman, that would not be I,
5 If she would not deny?
6 Then as th' earth's inward narrow crooked lanes
7 Do purge sea water's fretful salt away,
8 I thought, if I could draw my pains
9 Through rhyme's vexation, I should them allay.
10 Grief brought to numbers cannot be so fierce,
11 For he tames it, that fetters it in verse.

12 But when I have done so,
13 Some man, his art and voice to show,
14 Doth set and sing my pain;
15 And, by delighting many, frees again
16 Grief, which verse did restrain.
17 To love and grief tribute of verse belongs,
18 But not of such as pleases when 'tis read.
19 Both are increased by such songs,
20 For both their triumphs so are published,
21 And I, which was two fools, do so grow three;
22 Who are a little wise, the best fools be.

 

A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning

1 As virtuous men pass mildly away,
2 And whisper to their souls, to go,
3 Whilst some of their sad friends do say,
4 "The breath goes now," and some say, "No:"

5 So let us melt, and make no noise,
6 No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move;
7 'Twere profanation of our joys
8 To tell the laity our love.

9 Moving of th' earth brings harms and fears;
10 Men reckon what it did, and meant;
11 But trepidation of the spheres,
12 Though greater far, is innocent.

13 Dull sublunary lovers' love
14 (Whose soul is sense) cannot admit
15 Absence, because it doth remove
16 Those things which elemented it.

17 But we by a love so much refin'd,
18 That ourselves know not what it is,
19 Inter-assured of the mind,
20 Care less, eyes, lips, and hands to miss.

21 Our two souls therefore, which are one,
22 Though I must go, endure not yet
23 A breach, but an expansion,
24 Like gold to airy thinness beat.

25 If they be two, they are two so
26 As stiff twin compasses are two;
27 Thy soul, the fix'd foot, makes no show
28 To move, but doth, if the' other do.

29 And though it in the centre sit,
30 Yet when the other far doth roam,
31 It leans, and hearkens after it,
32 And grows erect, as that comes home.

33 Such wilt thou be to me, who must
34 Like th' other foot, obliquely run;
35 Thy firmness makes my circle just,
36 And makes me end, where I begun.

 

A Valediction: Of Weeping

1 Let me pour forth
2 My tears before thy face, whilst I stay here,
3 For thy face coins them, and thy stamp they bear,
4 And by this mintage they are something worth,
5 For thus they be
6 Pregnant of thee;
7 Fruits of much grief they are, emblems of more,
8 When a tear falls, that thou falls which it bore,
9 So thou and I are nothing then, when on a diverse shore.

10 On a round ball
11 A workman that hath copies by, can lay
12 An Europe, Afric, and an Asia,
13 And quickly make that, which was nothing, all;
14 So doth each tear
15 Which thee doth wear,
16 A globe, yea world, by that impression grow,
17 Till thy tears mix'd with mine do overflow
18 This world; by waters sent from thee, my heaven dissolved so.

19 O more than moon,
20 Draw not up seas to drown me in thy sphere,
21 Weep me not dead, in thine arms, but forbear
22 To teach the sea what it may do too soon;
23 Let not the wind
24 Example find,
25 To do me more harm than it purposeth;
26 Since thou and I sigh one another's breath,
27 Whoe'er sighs most is cruellest, and hastes the other's death.

 

Batter My Heart

Batter my heart, three-person'd God, for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend
Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurp'd town to'another due,
Labor to'admit you, but oh, to no end;
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captiv'd, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly'I love you, and would be lov'd fain,
But am betroth'd unto your enemy;
Divorce me,'untie or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you'enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

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