by John Donne
And what at first was called a gust, the same
Hath now a storm's, anon a tempest's name.
Jonas, I pity thee, and curse those men,
Who when the storm raged most, did wake thee then;
Sleep is pain's easiest salve, and doth fulfil
All offices of death, except to kill.
But when I waked, I saw, that I saw not.
I, and the sun, which should teach me had forgot
East, west, day, night, and I could only say,
If the world had lasted, now it had been day.
Thousands our noises were, yet we 'mongst all
Could none by his right name, but thunder call:
Lightning was all our light, and it rained more
Than if the sun had drunk the sea before.
Some coffined in their cabins lie, equally
Grieved that they are not dead, and yet must die.
And as sin-burdened souls from graves will creep,
At the last day, some forth their cabins peep:
And tremblingly ask what news, and do hear so,
Like jealous husbands, what they would not know.
Some sitting on the hatches, would seem there,
With hideous gazing to fear away fear.
Then note they the ship's sicknesses, the mast
Shaked with this ague, and the hold and waist
With a salt dropsy clogged, and all our tacklings
Snapping, like too high stretched treble strings.
And from our tottered sails, rags drop down so,
As from one hanged in chains, a year ago.
Even our ordnance placed for our defence,
Strive to break loose, and 'scape away from thence.
Pumping hath tired our men, and what's the gain?
Seas into seas thrown, we suck in again;
Hearing hath deafed our sailors; and if they
Knew how to hear, there's none knows what to say.
Compared to these storms, death is but a qualm,
Hell somewhat lightsome, and the Bermuda calm.
Darkness, light's elder brother, his birth-right
Claims o'er this world, and to heaven hath chased light.
All things are one, and that one none can be,
Since all forms, uniform deformity
Doth cover, so that we, except God say
Another Fiat, shall have no more day.
So violent, yet long these furies be,
That though thine absence starve me, I wish not thee.
The Calm
Our storm is past, and that storm's tyrannous rage,
A stupid calm, but nothing it, doth 'suage.
The fable is inverted, and far more
A block afflicts, now, than a stork before.
Storms chafe, and soon wear out themselves, or us;
In calms, heaven laughs to see us languish thus.
As steady as I can wish, that my thoughts were,
Smooth as thy mistress' glass, or what shines there,
The sea is now. And, as those Isles which we
Seek, when we can move, our ships rooted be.
As water did in storms, now pitch runs out
As lead, when a fired church becomes one spout.
And all our beauty, and our trim, decays,
Like courts removing, or like ended plays.
The fighting place now seamen's rags supply;
And all the tackling is a frippery.
No use of lanthorns; and in one place lay
Feathers and dust, today and yesterday.
Earth's hollownesses, which the world's lungs are,
Have no more wind than the upper vault of air.
We can nor lost friends, nor sought foes recover,
But meteor-like, save that we move not, hover.
Only the calenture together draws
Dear friends, which meet dead in great fishes' jaws:
And on the hatches as on altars lies
Each one, his own priest, and own sacrifice.
Who live, that miracle do multiply
Where walkers in hot ovens, do not die.
If in despite of these, we swim, that hath
No more refreshing, than our brimstone bath,
But from the sea, into the ship we turn,
Like parboiled wretches, on the coals to burn.
Like Bajazet encaged, the shepherd's scoff,
Or like slack-sinewed Samson, his hair off,
Languish our ships. Now, as a myriad
Of ants, durst th' Emperor's loved snake invade,
The crawling galleys, sea-gaols, finny chips,
Might brave our pinnaces, now bed-rid ships.
Whether a rotten state, and hope of gain,
Or, to disuse me from the queasy pain
Of being beloved, and loving, or the thirst
Of honour, or fair death, out pushed me first,
I lose my end: for here as well as I
A desperate may live, and a coward die.
Stag, dog, and all which from, or towards flies,
Is paid with life, or prey, or doing dies.
Fate grudges us all, and doth subtly lay
A scourge, 'gainst which we all forget to pray,
He that at sea prays for more wind, as well
Under the poles may beg cold, heat in hell.
What are we then? How little more alas
Is man now, than before he was! he was
Nothing; for us, we are for nothing fit;
Chance, or ourselves still disproportion it.
We have no power, no will, no sense; I lie,
I should not then thus feel this misery.
To Mr B. B.
Is not thy sacred hunger of science
Yet satisfied? Is not thy brain's rich hive
Fulfilled with honey which thou dost derive
From the arts' spirits and their quintessence?
Then wean thyself at last, and thee withdraw
From Cambridge thy old nurse, and, as the rest,
Here toughly chew, and sturdily digest
Th' immense vast volumes of our common law;
And begin soon, lest my grief grieve thee too,
Which is, that that which I should have begun
In my youth's morning, now late must be done;
And I as giddy travellers must do,
Which stray or sleep all day, and having lost
Light and strength, dark and tired must then ride post.
If thou unto thy Muse be married,
Embrace her ever, ever multiply,
Be far from me that strange adultery
To tempt thee and procure her widowhead.
My Muse (for I had one,) because I am cold,
Divorced herself: the cause being in me,
That I can take no new in bigamy,
Not my will only but power doth withhold.
Hence comes it, that these rhymes which never had
Mother, want matter, and they only have
A little form, the which their father gave;
They are profane, imperfect, oh, too bad
To be counted children of poetry
Except confirmed and bishoped by thee.
To Mr C. B.
Thy friend, whom thy deserts to thee enchain,
Urged by this inexcusable occasion,
Thee and the saint of his affection
Leaving behind, doth of both wants complain;
And let the love I bear to both sustain
No blot nor maim by this division,
Strong is this love which ties our hearts in one,
And strong that love pursued with amorous pain;
But though besides thyself I leave behind
Heaven's liberal, and earth's thrice-fairer sun,
Going to where stern winter aye doth won,
Yet, love's hot fires, which martyr my sad mind,
Do send forth scalding sighs, which have the art
To melt all ice, bu
t that which walls her heart.
To Mr S. B.
O thou which to search out the secret parts
Of the India, or rather paradise
Of knowledge, hast with courage and advice
Lately launched into the vast sea of arts,
Disdain not in thy constant travailing
To do as other voyagers, and make
Some turns into less creeks, and wisely take
Fresh water at the Heliconian spring;
I sing not, siren like, to tempt; for I
Am harsh; nor as those schismatics with you,
Which draw all wits of good hope to their crew;
But seeing in you bright sparks of poetry,
I, though I brought no fuel, had desire
With these articulate blasts to blow the fire.
To Mr E. G.
Even as lame things thirst their perfection, so
The slimy rhymes bred in our vale below,
Bearing with them much of my love and heart,
Fly unto that Parnassus, where thou art.
There thou o'erseest London: here I have been
By staying in London too much overseen.
Now pleasure's dearth our city doth possess,
Our theatres are filled with emptiness;
As lank and thin is every street and way
As a woman delivered yesterday.
Nothing whereat to laugh my spleen espies
But bearbaitings or law exercise.
Therefore I'll leave it, and in the country strive
Pleasure, now fled from London, to retrieve.
Do thou so too: and fill not like a bee
Thy thighs with honey, but as plenteously
As Russian merchants, thyself's whole vessel load,
And then at winter retail it here abroad.
Bless us with Suffolk's sweets; and as that is
Thy garden, make thy hive and warehouse this.
To Mr I. L.
Blessed are your north parts, for all this long time
My sun is with you, cold and dark is our clime;
Heaven's sun, which stayed so long from us this year,
Stayed in your north (I think) for she was there,
And hither by kind nature drawn from thence,
Here rages, chafes and threatens pestilence;
Yet I, as long as she from hence doth stay,
Think this no south, no summer, nor no day.
With thee my kind and unkind heart is run,
There sacrifice it to that beauteous sun:
And since thou art in paradise and needst crave
No joy's addition, help thy friend to save.
So may thy pastures with their flowery feasts,
As suddenly as lard, fat thy lean beasts;
So may thy woods oft polled, yet ever wear
A green, and when thee list, a golden hair;
So may all thy sheep bring forth twins; and so
In chase and race may thy horse all outgo;
So may thy love and courage ne'er be cold;
Thy son ne'er ward; thy loved wife ne'er seem old;
But mayst thou wish great things, and them attain,
As thou tell'st her, and none but her my pain.
To Mr I. L.
Of that short roll of friends writ in my heart
Which with thy name begins, since their depart,
Whether in the English Provinces they be,
Or drink of Po, Sequan, or Danuby,
There 's none that sometimes greets us not, and yet
Your Trent is Lethe; that past, us you forget.
You do not duties of societies,
If from the embrace of a loved wife you rise,
View your fat beasts, stretched barns, and laboured fields,
Eat, play, ride, take all joys which all day yields,
And then again to your embracements go:
Some hours on us your friends, and some bestow
Upon your Muse, else both we shall repent,
I that my love, she that her gifts on you are spent.
To Mr R. W.
If, as mine is, thy life a slumber be,
Seem, when thou read'st these lines, to dream of me,
Never did Morpheus nor his brother wear
Shapes so like those shapes, whom they would appear,
As this my letter is like me, for it
Hath my name, words, hand, feet, heart, mind and wit;
It is my deed of gift of me to thee,
It is my will, myself the legacy.
So thy retirings I love, yea envy,
Bred in thee by a wise melancholy,
That I rejoice, that unto where thou art,
Though I stay here, I can thus send my heart,
As kindly as any enamoured patient
His picture to his absent love hath sent.
All news I think sooner reach thee than me;
Havens are heavens, and ships winged angels be,
The which both gospel, and stern threatenings bring;
Guiana's harvest is nipped in the spring,
I fear; and with us (methinks) Fate deals so
As with the Jews' guide God did; he did show
Him the rich land, but barred his entry in:
Oh, slowness is our punishment and sin.
Perchance, these Spanish business being done,
Which as the earth between the moon and sun
Eclipse the light which Guiana would give,
Our discontinued hopes we shall retrieve:
But if (as all th' all must) hopes smoke away,
Is not almighty virtue an India?
If men be worlds, there is in every one
Something to answer in some proportion
All the world's riches: and in good men, this
Virtue, our form's form and our soul's soul, is.
To Mr R. W.
Kindly I envy thy song's perfection
Built of all th' elements as our bodies are:
That little of earth that'is in it, is a fair
Delicious garden where all sweets are sown.
In it is cherishing fire which dries in me
Grief which did drown me: and half quenched by it
Are satiric fires which urged me to have writ
In scorn of all: for now I admire thee.
And as air doth fulfil the hollowness
Of rotten walls; so it mine emptiness,
Where tossed and moved it did beget this sound
Which as a lame echo of thine doth rebound.
Oh, I was dead; but since thy song new life did give,
I recreated even by thy creature live.
To Mr R. W.
Muse not that by thy mind thy body is led:
For by thy mind, my mind's distempered.
So thy care lives long, for I bearing part
It eats not only thine, by my swoll'n heart.
And when it gives us intermission
We take new hearts for it to feed upon.
But as a lay man's genius doth control
Body and mind; the Muse being the soul's soul
Of poets, that methinks should ease our anguish,
Although our bodies wither and minds languish.
Write then, that my griefs which thine got may be
Cured by thy charming sovereign melody.
To Mr R. W.
Zealously my Muse doth salute all thee
Inquiring of that mystic trinity
Whereof thou and all to whom heavens do infuse
Like fire, are made; thy body, mind, and Muse.
Dost thou recover sickness, or prevent?
Or is thy mind travailed with discontent?
Or art thou parted from the world and me,
In a good scorn of the world's vanity?
Or is thy devout Muse retired to sing
Upon her tender elegiac string?
Our minds part not, join then thy Muse with mine
For mine is
barren thus divorced from thine.
To Mr Roland Woodward
Like one who in her third widowhood doth profess
Herself a nun, tied to retiredness,
So affects my Muse now, a chaste fallowness,
Since she to few, yet to too many hath shown
How love-song weeds, and satiric thorns are grown
Where seeds of better arts, were early sown.
Though to use, and love poetry, to me,
Betrothed to no one art, be no adultery;
Omissions of good, ill, as ill deeds be.
For though to us it seem, and be light and thin,
Yet in those faithful scales, where God throws in
Men's works, vanity weighs as much as sin.
If our souls have stained their first white, yet we
May clothe them with faith, and dear honesty,
Which God imputes, as native purity.
There is no virtue, but religion:
Wise, valiant, sober, just, are names, which none
Want, which want not vice-covering discretion.
Seek we then ourselves in ourselves; for as
Men force the sun with much more force to pass,
By gathering his beams with a crystal glass;
So we, if we into ourselves will turn,
Blowing our sparks of virtue, may outburn
The straw, which doth about our hearts sojourn.
You know, physicians, when they would infuse
Into any oil, the soul of simples, use
Places, where they may lie still warm, to choose.
So works retiredness in us; to roam
Giddily, and be everywhere, but at home,
Such freedom doth a banishment become.
We are but farmers of our selves, yet may,
If we can stock our selves, and thrive, uplay
Much, much dear treasure for the great rent day.
Manure thy self then, to thy self be approved,
And with vain outward things be no more moved,
But to know, that I love thee and would be loved.
To Mr T. W.
All hail, sweet poet, more full of more strong fire,
Than hath or shall enkindle any spirit,
I loved what nature gave thee, but this merit
Of wit and art I love not but admire;
Who have before or shall write after thee,
Their works, though toughly laboured, will be
Like infancy or age to man's firm stay,
Or early and late twilights to midday.
Men say, and truly, that they better be
