A Valediction: of Weeping
A Valediction: of Weeping
Original Text
John Donne, Poems, by J. D. With elegies on the authors death (M. F. for J. Marriot, 1633). MICF no. 556 ROBA. Facs. edn. Menston: Scolar Press, 1969. PR 2245 A2 1633A. STC 7045.
1 Let me pour forth
2My tears before thy face, whilst I stay here,
3For thy face coins them, and thy stamp they bear,
4And by this mintage they are something worth,
5 For thus they be
6 Pregnant of thee;
7Fruits of much grief they are, emblems of more,
9So thou and I are nothing then, when on a diverse shore.
11A workman that hath copies by, can lay
12An Europe, Afric, and an Asia,
13And quickly make that, which was nothing, all;
14 So doth each tear
16A globe, yea world, by that impression grow,
17Till thy tears mix'd with mine do overflow
19 O more than moon,
21Weep me not dead, in thine arms, but forbear
22To teach the sea what it may do too soon;
23 Let not the wind
24 Example find,
25To do me more harm than it purposeth;
26Since thou and I sigh one another's breath,
27Whoe'er sighs most is cruellest, and hastes the other's death.
Notes
8] each tear bears her image; if the lovers are in separate countries and both tear and image are lost, the lovers are then nothing. Back to Line
10] round ball: globe. Back to Line
15] thee doth wear: bears her image. Back to Line
18] This world: the world which his tear has become by bearing her image. Back to Line
20] thy sphere. In the Ptolemaic astronomical system each of the heavenly bodies revolved in its own shell or sphere. Back to Line
Publication Start Year
1633
RPO poem Editors
N. J. Endicott
RPO Edition
3RP 1.168.
Rhyme