John Donne

When my grave is broke up again Some second guest to entertain, (For graves have learn'd that woman head, To be to more than one a bed) And he that digs it, spies A bracelet of bright hair about the bone, Will he not let'us alone, And think that there a loving couple lies, Who thought that this device might be some way To make their souls, at the last busy day, Meet at this grave, and make a little stay? If this fall in a time, or land, Where mis-devotion doth command, Then he, that digs us up, will bring Us to the bishop, and the king, To make us relics; then Thou shalt be a Mary Magdalen, and I A something else thereby; All women shall adore us, and some men; And since at such time miracles are sought, I would have that age by this paper taught What miracles we harmless lovers wrought. First, we lov'd well and faithfully, Yet knew not what we lov'd, nor why; Difference of sex no more we knew Than our guardian angels do; Coming and going, we Perchance might kiss, but not between those meals; Our hands ne'er touch'd the seals Which nature, injur'd by late law, sets free; These miracles we did, but now alas, All measure, and all language, I should pass, Should I tell what a miracle she was.

(excerpt) OF THE PROGRESS OF THE SOUL Wherein, by occasion of the religious death of Mistress Elizabeth Drury, the incommodities of the soul in this her life, and her exaltation in the next, are contemplated THE SECOND ANNIVERSARY Forget this rotten world, and unto thee Let thine own times as an old story be. Be not concern'd; study not why, nor when; Do not so much as not believe a man. For though to err, be worst, to try truths forth Is far more business than this world is worth. I'he world is but a carcass; thou art fed By it, but as a worm, that carcass bred; And why shouldst thou, poor worm, consider more, When this world will grow better than before, Than those thy fellow-worms do think upon That carcass's last resurrection? Forget this world, and scarce think of it so, As of old clothes, cast off a year ago. To be thus stupid is alacrity; Men thus lethargic have best memory. Look upward; that's towards her, whose happy state We now lament not, but congratulate. She, to whom all this world was but a stage, Where all sat heark'ning how her youthful age Should be employ'd, because in all she did Some figure of the golden times was hid. Who could not lack, what'er this world could give, Because she was the form, that made it live; Nor could complain that this world was unfit To be stay'd in, then when she was in it; She, that first tried indifferent desires By virtue, and virtue by religious fires; She, to whose person paradise adher'd, As courts to princes; she, whose eyes enspher'd Star-light enough t' have made the South control, (Had she been there) the star-full Northern Pole; She, she is gone; she is gone; when thou knowest this, What fragmentary rubbish this world is Thou knowest, and that it is not worth a thought; He honours it too much that thinks it nought. Think then, my soul, that death is but a groom, Which brings a taper to the outward room, Whence thou spiest first a little glimmering light, And after brings it nearer to thy sight; For such approaches doth heaven make in death. Think thyself labouring now with broken breath, And think those broken and soft notes to be Division, and thy happiest harmony. Think thee laid on thy death-bed, loose and slack, And think that but unbinding of a pack, To take one precious thing, thy soul, from thence. Think thyself parch'd with fever's violence; Anger thine ague more, by calling it Thy physic; chide the slackness of the fit. Think that thou hear'st thy knell, and think no more, But that, as bells call'd thee to church before, So this to the Triumphant Church calls thee. Think Satan's sergeants round about thee be, And think that but for legacies they thrust; Give one thy pride, to'another give thy lust; Give them those sins which they gave thee before, And trust th' immaculate blood to wash thy score. Think thy friends weeping round, and think that they Weep but because they go not yet thy way. Think that they close thine eyes, and think in this, That they confess much in the world amiss, Who dare not trust a dead man's eye with that Which they from God and angels cover not. Think that they shroud thee up, and think from thence They reinvest thee in white innocence. Think that thy body rots, and (if so low, Thy soul exalted so, thy thoughts can go) Think thee a prince, who of themselves create Worms, which insensibly devour their state. Think that they bury thee, and think that rite Lays thee to sleep but a Saint Lucy's night.

'Tis the year's midnight, and it is the day's, Lucy's, who scarce seven hours herself unmasks; The sun is spent, and now his flasks Send forth light squibs, no constant rays; The world's whole sap is sunk; The general balm th' hydroptic earth hath drunk, Whither, as to the bed's feet, life is shrunk, Dead and interr'd; yet all these seem to laugh, Compar'd with me, who am their epitaph. Study me then, you who shall lovers be At the next world, that is, at the next spring; For I am every dead thing, In whom Love wrought new alchemy. For his art did express A quintessence even from nothingness, From dull privations, and lean emptiness; He ruin'd me, and I am re-begot Of absence, darkness, death: things which are not. All others, from all things, draw all that's good, Life, soul, form, spirit, whence they being have; I, by Love's limbec, am the grave Of all that's nothing. Oft a flood Have we two wept, and so Drown'd the whole world, us two; oft did we grow To be two chaoses, when we did show Care to aught else; and often absences Withdrew our souls, and made us carcasses. But I am by her death (which word wrongs her) Of the first nothing the elixir grown; Were I a man, that I were one I needs must know; I should prefer, If I were any beast, Some ends, some means; yea plants, yea stones detest, And love; all, all some properties invest; If I an ordinary nothing were, As shadow, a light and body must be here. But I am none; nor will my sun renew. You lovers, for whose sake the lesser sun At this time to the Goat is run To fetch new lust, and give it you, Enjoy your summer all; Since she enjoys her long night's festival, Let me prepare towards her, and let me call This hour her vigil, and her eve, since this Both the year's, and the day's deep midnight is.

If yet I have not all thy love, Dear, I shall never have it all; I cannot breathe one other sigh, to move, Nor can intreat one other tear to fall; And all my treasure, which should purchase thee— Sighs, tears, and oaths, and letters—I have spent. Yet no more can be due to me, Than at the bargain made was meant; If then thy gift of love were partial, That some to me, some should to others fall, Dear, I shall never have thee all. Or if then thou gavest me all, All was but all, which thou hadst then; But if in thy heart, since, there be or shall New love created be, by other men, Which have their stocks entire, and can in tears, In sighs, in oaths, and letters, outbid me, This new love may beget new fears, For this love was not vow'd by thee. And yet it was, thy gift being general; The ground, thy heart, is mine; whatever shall Grow there, dear, I should have it all. Yet I would not have all yet, He that hath all can have no more; And since my love doth every day admit New growth, thou shouldst have new rewards in store; Thou canst not every day give me thy heart, If thou canst give it, then thou never gavest it; Love's riddles are, that though thy heart depart, It stays at home, and thou with losing savest it; But we will have a way more liberal, Than changing hearts, to join them; so we shall Be one, and one another's all.

I scarce believe my love to be so pure As I had thought it was, Because it doth endure Vicissitude, and season, as the grass; Methinks I lied all winter, when I swore My love was infinite, if spring make’ it more. But if medicine, love, which cures all sorrow With more, not only be no quintessence, But mixed of all stuffs paining soul or sense, And of the sun his working vigor borrow, Love’s not so pure, and abstract, as they use To say, which have no mistress but their muse, But as all else, being elemented too, Love sometimes would contemplate, sometimes do. And yet no greater, but more eminent, Love by the spring is grown; As, in the firmament, Stars by the sun are not enlarged, but shown, Gentle love deeds, as blossoms on a bough, From love’s awakened root do bud out now. If, as water stirred more circles be Produced by one, love such additions take, Those, like so many spheres, but one heaven make, For they are all concentric unto thee; And though each spring do add to love new heat, As princes do in time of action get New taxes, and remit them not in peace, No winter shall abate the spring’s increase.

I long to talk with some old lover's ghost, Who died before the god of love was born. I cannot think that he, who then lov'd most, Sunk so low as to love one which did scorn. But since this god produc'd a destiny, And that vice-nature, custom, lets it be, I must love her, that loves not me. Sure, they which made him god, meant not so much, Nor he in his young godhead practis'd it. But when an even flame two hearts did touch, His office was indulgently to fit Actives to passives. Correspondency Only his subject was; it cannot be Love, till I love her, that loves me. But every modern god will now extend His vast prerogative as far as Jove. To rage, to lust, to write to, to commend, All is the purlieu of the god of love. O! were we waken'd by this tyranny To ungod this child again, it could not be I should love her, who loves not me. Rebel and atheist too, why murmur I, As though I felt the worst that love could do? Love might make me leave loving, or might try A deeper plague, to make her love me too; Which, since she loves before, I'am loth to see. Falsehood is worse than hate; and that must be, If she whom I love, should love me.

Some that have deeper digg'd love's mine than I, Say, where his centric happiness doth lie; I have lov'd, and got, and told, But should I love, get, tell, till I were old, I should not find that hidden mystery. Oh, 'tis imposture all! And as no chemic yet th'elixir got, But glorifies his pregnant pot If by the way to him befall Some odoriferous thing, or medicinal, So, lovers dream a rich and long delight, But get a winter-seeming summer's night. Our ease, our thrift, our honour, and our day, Shall we for this vain bubble's shadow pay? Ends love in this, that my man Can be as happy'as I can, if he can Endure the short scorn of a bridegroom's play? That loving wretch that swears 'Tis not the bodies marry, but the minds, Which he in her angelic finds, Would swear as justly that he hears, In that day's rude hoarse minstrelsy, the spheres. Hope not for mind in women; at their best Sweetness and wit, they'are but mummy, possess'd.

Stand still, and I will read to thee A lecture, love, in love's philosophy. These three hours that we have spent, Walking here, two shadows went Along with us, which we ourselves produc'd. But, now the sun is just above our head, We do those shadows tread, And to brave clearness all things are reduc'd. So whilst our infant loves did grow, Disguises did, and shadows, flow From us, and our cares; but now 'tis not so. That love has not attain'd the high'st degree, Which is still diligent lest others see. Except our loves at this noon stay, We shall new shadows make the other way. As the first were made to blind Others, these which come behind Will work upon ourselves, and blind our eyes. If our loves faint, and westwardly decline, To me thou, falsely, thine, And I to thee mine actions shall disguise. The morning shadows wear away, But these grow longer all the day; But oh, love's day is short, if love decay. Love is a growing, or full constant light, And his first minute, after noon, is night.

I am unable, yonder beggar cries, To stand, or move; if he say true, he lies.

I can love both fair and brown, Her whom abundance melts, and her whom want betrays, Her who loves loneness best, and her who masks and plays, Her whom the country formed, and whom the town, Her who believes, and her who tries, Her who still weeps with spongy eyes, And her who is dry cork, and never cries; I can love her, and her, and you, and you, I can love any, so she be not true. Will no other vice content you? Will it not serve your turn to do as did your mothers? Or have you all old vices spent, and now would find out others? Or doth a fear that men are true torment you? O we are not, be not you so; Let me, and do you, twenty know. Rob me, but bind me not, and let me go. Must I, who came to travail thorough you, Grow your fixed subject, because you are true? Venus heard me sigh this song, And by love's sweetest part, variety, she swore, She heard not this till now; and that it should be so no more. She went, examined, and returned ere long, And said, Alas! some two or three Poor heretics in love there be, Which think to ’stablish dangerous constancy. But I have told them, Since you will be true, You shall be true to them who are false to you.