John Donne
John Donne
John Donnewas an English poet and a cleric in the Church of England. He is considered the pre-eminent representative of the metaphysical poets. His works are noted for their strong, sensual style and include sonnets, love poems, religious poems, Latin translations, epigrams, elegies, songs, satires and sermons. His poetry is noted for its vibrancy of language and inventiveness of metaphor, especially compared to that of his contemporaries. Donne's style is characterised by abrupt openings and various paradoxes, ironies and dislocations...
cute-love face knew loved sweet-love thy twice
Twice or thrice had I loved thee, Before I knew thy face or name.
best deaths die fitter hope love nor since sweetest thus weariness
Sweetest love, I do not go, / For weariness of thee, / Nor in hope the world can show / A fitter Love for me; / But since that I / Must die at last, 'tis best / To use myself in jest, / Thus by feigned deaths to die.
love sweet art
Love was as subtly caught, as a disease; But being got it is a treasure sweet, which to defend is harder than to get: And ought not be profaned on either part, for though 'Tis got by chance, 'Tis kept by art.
again broke grave guest second
When my grave is broke up again / Some second guest to entertain.
rejection body
To be no part of any body, is to be nothing.
love beauty sarcastic
Love built on beauty, soon as beauty, dies.
call ghosts life
Yet call not this long life; but think that IAm, by being dead, immortal; can ghosts die?
call ghosts
Yet call not this long life; but think that I Am, by being dead, immortal; can ghosts die?
met though till
Though she were true, when you met her,/ And last, till you write your letter, / Yet she / Will be / False, ere I come, to two, or three.
affect angels face knew loved thy twice worshipped
Twice or thrice had I loved thee, Before I knew thy face or name; So in a voice, so in a shapeless flame, Angels affect us oft, and worshipped be
Be your own palace, or the world is your jail.
bodies far though
But O alas, so long, so far / Our bodies why do we forbear? / They're ours, though they're not we, we are / The intelligences, they the sphere.
brave braver doth hid spring
I have done one brave thing - Than all the Worthies did; And yet a braver thence doth spring - Which is to keep that hid
busy call curtains dost motions seasons thou thy unruly
Busy old fool, unruly Sun, / Why dost thou thus, / Through windows, and through curtains call on us? / Must to thy motions lovers' seasons run?