John Donne - Delphi Poets Series (35 page)
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Authors: John Donne
Conclusion.
Here in a place, where mis-deuotion frames
A thousand praiers to Saints, whose very names
The ancient Church knew not, Heauen knowes not yet,
And where, what lawes of Poetry admit,
Lawes of Religion, haue at least the same,
Immortall Maid, I might inuoke thy name.
Could any Saint prouoke that appetit,
Thou here shouldst make mee a french conuertite.
But thou wouldst not; nor wouldst thou be content,
To take this, for my second yeeres true Rent,
Did this Coine beare any other stampe, then his,
That gaue thee power to doe me, to say this.
Since his will is, that to posteritee,
Thou shouldest for life, & death, a patterne bee,
And that the world should notice haue of this,
The purpose, and th’Authority is his;
Thou art the Proclamation, and I ame
The Trumpet, at whose voice the people came.
FINIS
LATIN POEMS
CONTENTS
DE LIBRO CUM MUTUARETUR IMPRESSO
AMICISSIMO, ET MERITISSIMO BEN. JOHNSON
TRANSLATED OUT OF GAZÆUS, VOTA AMICO FACTA. FOL.160
DE LIBRO CUM MUTUARETUR IMPRESSO
DOMI A PUERIS FRUSTATIM LACERATO; ET
POST REDDITO MANUSCRIPTO
Doctissimo Amicissimoque V.
D. D. Andrews
PARTURIUNT madido quae nixu praela, recepta,
Sed quae scripta manu, sunt veneranda magis,
Qui liber in pluteos, blattis cinerique relictos,
Si modo sit praeli sanguine tinctus, abit;
Accedat calamo scriptus, reverenter habetur,
Involat et veterum scrinia summa Patrum.
Dicat Apollo modum; Pueros infundere libro
Nempe vetustatem canitiemque novo.
Nil mirum, medico pueros de semine natos,
Haec nova fata libro posse dedisse novo.
Si veterem faciunt pueri, qui nuperus, Annon
Ipse Pater juvenem me dabit arte senem?
Hei miseris senibus! nos vertit dura senectus
Omnes in pueros, neminem at in juvenem.
Hoc tibi servasti praestandum, Antique Dierum,
Quo viso, et vivit, et juvenescit Adam.
Interea, infirmae fallamus taedia vitae,
Libris, et Coelorum aemulâ amicitiâ.
Hos inter, qui a te mihi redditus iste libellus,
Non mihi tam charus, tam meus, ante fuit.
EPIGRAMMA
Transiit in Sequanam Moenus; Victoris in aedes;
Et Francofurtum, te revehente, meat.
AMICISSIMO, ET MERITISSIMO BEN. JOHNSON
In Vulponem
QUOD arte ausus es hic tuâ, Poeta,
Si auderent hominum Deique juris
Consulti, veteres sequi aemularierque,
O omnes saperemus ad salutem.
His sed sunt veteres araneosi;
Tam nemo veterum est sequutor, ut tu
Illos quod sequeris novator audis.
Fac tamen quod agis; tuique prima
Libri canitie induantur horâ:
Nam chartis pueritia est neganda,
Nascanturque senes, oportet, illi
Libri, queis dare vis perennitatem.
Priscis, ingenium facit, laborque
Te parem; hos superes, ut et futuros,
Ex nostrâ vitiositate sumas,
Quâ priscos superamus, et futuros.
TO MR. GEORGE HERBERT
With one of my seals, of the anchor and Christ
QUI prius assuetus Serpentum fasce Tabellas
Signare, (haec nostrae symbola parva Domus)
Adscitus domui Domini, patrioque relicto
Stemmate, nanciscor stemmata jure nova.
Hinc mihi Crux primo quae fronti impressa lavacro,
Finibus extensis, anchora facta patet.
Anchorae in effigiem Crux tandem desinit ipsam,
Anchora fit tandem Crux tolerata diu.
Hoc tamen ut fiat, Christo vegetatur ab ipso
Crux, et ab Affixo, est Anchora facta, jesu.
Nec Natalitiis pen;tus serpentibus orbor,
Non ita dat Deus, ut auferat ante data.
Quâ sapiens, Dos est; Quâ terram lambit et ambit,
Pestis; At in nostra fit Medicina Cruce,
Serpens; fixa Cruci si sit Natura; Crucique
A fixo, nobis, Gratia tota fluat.
Omnia cum Crux sint, Crux Anchora facta, sigillum
Non tam dicendum hoc quam Catechismus erit.
Mitto nec exigua, exiguft sub imagine, dona,
Pignora amicitiae, et munera; Vota, preces.
Plura tibi accumulet, sanctus cognominis, Ille
Regia qui flavo Dona sigillat Equo.
A SHEAF OF SNAKES
A SHEAFE Of Snakes used heretofore to be
My Seal, The Crest of our poore Family.
Adopted in Gods Family, and so
Our old Coat lost, unto new armes I go.
The Crosse (my seal at Baptism) spred below,
Does, by that form, into an Anchor grow.
Crosses grow Anchors; Bear, as thou shouldst do
Thy Crosse, and that Crosse grows an Anchor too.
But he that makes our Crosses Anchors thus,
Is Christ, who there is crucifi’d for us.
Yet may I, with this, my first Serpents hold,
God gives new blessings, and yet leaves the old;
The Serpent, may, as wise, my pattern be;
My poison, as be feeds on dust, that’s me.
And as he rounds the Earth to murder sure,
My death he is, but on the Crosse, my cure.
Crucifie nature then, and then implore
All Grace from him, crucified there before;
When all is Crosse, and that Crosse Anchor grown,
This Seal’s a Catechism, not a Seal alone.
Under that little Seal great gifts I send,
[Wishes,] and prayers, pawns, and fruits of a friend.
And may that Saint which rides in our great Seal,
To you, who bear his name, great bounties deal.
TRANSLATED OUT OF GAZÆUS, VOTA AMICO FACTA. FOL.160
GOD grant thee thine own wish, and grant thee mine,
Thou, who dost, best friend, in best things outshine;
May thy soul, ever chearfull, nere know cares,
Nor thy life, ever lively, know gray haires.
Nor thy hand, ever open, know base holds,
Nor thy purse, ever plump, know pleits, or folds.
Nor thy tongue, ever true, know a false thing,
Nor thy word, ever mild, know quarrelling.
Nor thy works, ever equall, know disguise,
Nor thy fame, ever pure, know contumelies.
Nor thy prayers, know low objects, still Divine;
God grant thee thine own wish, and grant thee mine.
DOUBTFUL VERSES
These 24 spurious poems were unlikely to have been written by Donne, but appeared at various times after his death. Several of the poems contain similar themes to his famous works, e.g.
On a Flea on his Mistress’s Bosom
, but they are inferior imitations of Donne’s own poetic wit.
Please note:
these poems are not included in the following alphabetical and chronological contents tables.
CONTENTS
On a Flea on his Mistress’s Bosom
To a Lady of a Dark Complexion
Dr. Donne’s Farewell to the World
Absence
That time and absence proves
Rather helps than hurts to loves.
ABSENCE, hear thou my protestation
Against thy strength,
Distance, and length;
Do what thou canst for alteration,
For hearts of truest mettle
5
Absence doth join and time doth settle.
Who loves a mistress of such quality,
His mind hath found
Affection’s ground
Beyond time, place; and all mortality;
10
To hearts that cannot vary
Absence is present, Time doth tarry.
My senses want their outward motion,
Which now within
Reason doth win,
15
Redoubled by her secret notion;
Like rich men that take pleasure
In hiding more than handling treasure.
By absence this good means I gain,
That I can catch her,
20
Where none can watch her,
In some close corner of my brain;
There I embrace and kiss her,
And so enjoy her, and none miss her.
Love’s War
TILL I have peace with thee, war other men,
And when I have peace, can I leave thee then?
All other wars are scrupulous; only thou
O free fair city, mayst thyself allow
To any one. In Flanders, who can tell
5
Whether the master press, or men rebel?
Only we know, that which most idiots say,
They must bear blows which come to part the fray.
France in her lunatic giddiness did hate
Ever our men, yea, and our God, of late;
10
Yet she relies upon our angels well,
Which ne’er return, no more than they which fell.
Sick Ireland is with a strange war possest,
Like to an ague, now raging, now at rest,
Which time will cure; yet it must do her good
15
If she were purg’d, and her head-vein let blood;
And Midas joys our Spanish journeys give;
We touch all gold, but find no food to live;
And I should be in that hot parching clime
To dust and ashes turned before my time.
20
To mew me in a ship is to enthral
Me in a prison that were like to fall;
Or in a cloister, save that there men dwell
In a calm heaven, here in a swaying hell.
Long voyages are long consumptions,
25
And ships are carts for executions;
Yea, they are deaths; is ’t not all one to fly
Into another world, as ’tis to die?
Here let me war; in these arms let me lie:
Here let me parley, batter, bleed, and die. 30
Thine arms imprison me, and my arms thee;
Thy heart thy ransom is; take mine for me.
Other men war, that they their rest may gain,
But we will rest that we may fight again.
Those wars th’ ignorant, these th’ experienced love;
35
There we are always under, here above.
There engines far off breed a just true fear;
Near thrusts, pikes, stabs, yea, bullets, hurt not here.
There lies are wrongs; here safe uprightly lie.
There men kill men; we’ll make one by and by.
40
Thou nothing, I not half so much shall do
In those wars, as they may which from us two
Shall spring. Thousands we see which travel not
To war, but stay, swords, arms, and shot
To make at home; and shall not I do then 45
More glorious service, staying to make men?
On a Flea on his Mistress’s Bosom
MADAM, that flea which crept between your breasts
I envied, that there he should make his rest;
The little creature’s fortune was so good
That angels feed not on so precious food.
How it did suck, how eager tickle you!
5
—Madam, shall fleas before me tickle you?—
O! I not hold can; pardon if I killed it;
—Sweet blood, to you I ask this—that which filled it
Ran from my lady’s breast. Come, happy flea,
That died for sucking of that milky sea.
10
O! now again I could e’en wish thee there,
About her heart, about her anywhere;
I would now (dear flea) that thou shouldst not die,
If thou couldst suck from her her cruelty.
The Portrait
PAINTER, while there thou sit’st drawing the sight
That her unkind regard hath dyed in grief,
Dip black thy pencil, and forget the white,
That thou bestow’st on looks that win belief;
And when thy work is done, then let her see
5
The humble image of her cruelty.
Or if t’ unfold the sense of her disdain
Exceeds the narrow limits of thine art,
Then blot thy table, and forget thy pain,
Till thou hast learned the colours of her heart;
10
And let her then no sight or other show
But that void place where thou hast painted woe.