Confined Love (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631

Confined Love
by John Donne, published 1633

Some man unworthy to be possessor
Of old or new love, himself being false or weak,
    Thought his pain and shame would be lesser
If on womankind he might his anger wreak;
        And thence a law did grow:
        One might but one man know.
        But are other creatures so?

Are sun, moon, or stars by law forbidden
To smile where they list, or lend away their light?
    Are birds divorced or are they chidden
If they leave their mate, or lie abroad a night?
        Beasts do no jointures lose
        Though they new lovers choose,
        But we are made worse than those.

Who e’er rigged fair ships to lie in harbours,
And not to seek lands, or not to deal withal?
    Or built fair houses, set trees, and arbours,
Only to lock up, or else to let them fall?
        Good is not good, unless
        A thousand it possess,
        But doth waste with greediness.

* * *

   

Community (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631

Community
by John Donne, published 1633

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 we 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?

* * *

   

Death Be Not Proud (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631

Death Be Not Proud

Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think’st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell’st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.

* * *

   

The Apparition (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631


The Apparition


When by thy scorne, O murdresse, I am dead,
    And that thou thinkst thee free     
    From all solicitation from mee,
Then shall my ghost come to thy bed,     
    And thee, fain’d vestall, in worse armes shall see;
Then thy sicke taper will begin to winke,     
    And he whose thou art then, being tyr’d before,
Will, if thou stirre, or pinch to wake him, thinke  
        Thou call’st for more,
And in false sleepe will from thee shrinke,
And then poore Aspen wretch, neglected thou    
    Bath’d in a cold quicksilver sweat wilt lye    
         A veryer ghost than I;
What I will say, I will not tell thee now,
Lest that preserve thee; and since my love is spent,
I had rather thou shouldst painfully repent,
Than by my threatenings rest still innocent.
 

* * *

   

The Message (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631


The Message


Send home my long stray’d eyes to me,
Which, O! too long have dwelt on thee;
Yet since there they have learn’d such ill,
    Such forced fashions,
    And false passions,
        That they be
        Made by thee
Fit for no good sight, keep them still.

Send home my harmless heart again,
Which no unworthy thought could stain;
Which if it be taught by thine
    To make jestings
    Of protestings,
        And break both
        Word and oath,
Keep it, for then ’tis none of mine.

Yet send me back my heart and eyes,
That I may know, and see thy lies,
And may laugh and joy, when thou
    Art in anguish
    And dost languish
        For some one
        That will none,
Or prove as false as thou art now.
 

* * *

   

The Bait (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631


The Bait


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

There will the river whispering run,
Warm’d by thy eyes, more than the sun.
And there th’enamour’d fish will stay,
Begging themselves they may betray.

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

If thou, to be so seen, beest loath,
By sun or moon, thou darken’st both;
And if myself have leave to see,
I need not their light, having thee.

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

Let coarse bold hands from slimy nest
The bedded fish in banks out-wrest,
Or curious traitors, sleave-silk flies,
Bewitch poor fishes’ wandering eyes.

For thee, thou needest no such deceit,
For thou thyself art thine own bait;
That fish, that is not catch’d thereby,
Alas, is wiser far than I.

* * *

   

Love’s Usury (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631


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.

* * *

No Man Is an Island (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631


No Man Is an Island
[from Meditation XVII in John Donne’s Devotions upon Emergent Occasions]


No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend’s or of thine own were: any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.




* * *


   

A Burnt Ship (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631


A Burnt Ship

Out of a fired ship, which by no way

But drowning could be rescued from the flame,

Some men leap’d forth, and ever as they came

Near the foes’ ships, did by their shot decay;

So all were lost, which in the ship were found,

      They in the sea being burnt, they in the burnt ship drown’d.



* * *

The Flea (by John Donne)

John Donne, 1572-1631


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.