Poems, By J. D. [i.e. John Donne] With Elegies on the Authors Death |
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A Valediction forbidding mourning.
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 | Poems, By J. D. [i.e. John Donne] |  |
A Valediction forbidding mourning.
As virtuous men passe mildly away,
And whisper to the soules, to goe,
Whilst some of their sad friends doe say,
The breath goes now, and some say, no.
And whisper to the soules, to goe,
Whilst some of their sad friends doe say,
The breath goes now, and some say, no.
So let us melt, and make no noise,
No teare-floods, nor sigh-tempests move,
T'were prophanation of our joyes
To tell the layetie our love.
No teare-floods, nor sigh-tempests move,
T'were prophanation of our joyes
To tell the layetie our love.
Moving of th'earth brings harmes and feares,
Men reckon what it did and meant,
But trepidation of the spheares,
Though greater farre, is innocent.
Men reckon what it did and meant,
But trepidation of the spheares,
Though greater farre, is innocent.
164
Dull sublunary lovers love
(Whose soule is sense) cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
Those things which elemented it.
(Whose soule is sense) cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
Those things which elemented it.
But we by a love, so much refin'd,
That our selves know not what it is,
Inter-assured of the mind,
Care lesse, eyes, lips, hands to misse.
That our selves know not what it is,
Inter-assured of the mind,
Care lesse, eyes, lips, hands to misse.
Our two soules therefore, which are one,
Though I must goe, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion,
Like gold to ayery thinnesse beate.
Though I must goe, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion,
Like gold to ayery thinnesse beate.
If they be two, they are two so
As stiffe twin compasses are two,
Thy soule the fixt foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if the'other doe.
As stiffe twin compasses are two,
Thy soule the fixt foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if the'other doe.
And though it in the center sit,
Yet when the other far doth rome,
It leanes, and hearkens after it,
And growes erect, as that comes home.
Yet when the other far doth rome,
It leanes, and hearkens after it,
And growes erect, as that comes home.
Such wilt thou be to mee, who must
Like th'other foot, obliquely runne.
Thy firmnes makes my circle just,
And makes me end, where I begunne.
Like th'other foot, obliquely runne.
Thy firmnes makes my circle just,
And makes me end, where I begunne.
| Poems, By J. D. [i.e. John Donne] | |