John Donne - Delphi Poets Series (30 page)

X.

Man all at once was there by woman slaine,
And one by one we’are here slaine o’er againe
By them.  The mother poison’d the well-head,
The daughters here corrupt us, Rivolets,
No smalnesse scapes, no greatnesse breaks their nets,
She thrust us out, and by them we are led
Astray, from turning, to whence we are fled.
Were prisoners Judges, ‘twould seeme rigorous,
Shee sinn’d, we beare; part of our paine is, thus
    To love them, whose fault to this painfull love yoak’d us.

XI.

So fast in us doth this corruption grow,
That now wee dare aske why wee should be so.
Would God (disputes the curious Rebell) make
A law, and would not have it kept?  Or can
His creatures will, crosse his?  Of every man
For one, will God (and be just) vengeance take?
Who sinn’d? t’was not forbidden to the snake
Nor her, who was not then made; nor is’t writ
That Adam cropt, or knew the apple; yet
The worme and she, and he, and wee endure for it.

XII.

But snatch mee heavenly Spirit from this vaine
Reckoning their vanities, lesse is their gaine
Then hazard still, to meditate on ill,
Though with good minde, their reasons, like those toyes
Of glassie bubbles, which the gamesome boyes
Stretch to so nice a thinnes  through a quill
That they themselves breake, doe themselves spill,
Arguing is heretiques game, and Exercise
As wrastlers, perfects them; Not liberties
Of speech, but silence; hands, not tongues, end heresies.

XIII.

Just in that instant when the serpents gripe,
Broke the slight veines, and tender the conduit-pipe,
Through which this soule from the trees root did draw
Life, and growth to this apple, fled away
This loose soule, old, one and another day.
As lightning, which one scarce dares say, he saw,
‘Tis so soone gone, (and better proofe the law
Of sense, then faith requires) swiftly she flew
To a darke and foggie Plot; Her, her fates threw
    There through th’earths pores, and in a Plant hous’d her anew.

XIV.

The plant thus abled, to it selfe did force
A place, where no place was; by natures course
As aire from water, water fleets away
From thicker bodies, by this root thronged  so
His spungie confines gave him place to grow,
Just as in our streets, when the people stay
To see the Prince, and so fill up the way
That weesels scarce could passe, when she comes nere
They throng and cleave up, and a passage cleare,
    As if, for that time, their round bodies flatned were.

XV.

His right arme he thrust out towards the East,
West-ward his left; th’ends did themselves digest
Into ten lesser strings, these fingers were:
And as a slumberer stretching on his bed,
This way he this, and that way scattered
His other legge, which feet with toes upbeare;
Grew on his middle parts, the first day, haire,
To show, that in loves businesse hee should still
A dealer bee, and be us’d well, or ill:
    His apples kindle, his leaves, force of conception kill.

XVI.

A mouth, but dumbe, he hath; blinde eyes, deafe eares,
And to his shoulders dangle subtile haires;
A young Colussus there hee stands upright,
And as that ground by him were conquered
A leafe garland weares he on his head
Enchas’d with little fruits, so red and bright
That for them you would call your Loves lips white;
So, of a lone unhaunted place possest,
Did this soules second Inne, built by the guest
    This living buried man, this quiet mandrake, rest.

XVII.

No lustfull woman came this plant to grieve,
But ‘twas because there was none yet but Eve:
And she (with other purpose) kill’d it quite;
Her sinne had now brought in infirmities,
And so her cradled child, the moist red eyes
Had never shut, nor slept since it saw light,
Poppie she knew, she knew the mandrakes might;
And tore up both, and so coold her childs blood;
Unvirtuous weeds might long unvex’d have stood;
    But hee’s short liv’d, that with his death can doe most good.

XVIII.

To an unfettered soules quick nimble haste
Are falling stars, and hearts thoughts, but slow pac’d:
Thinner than burnt aire flies this soule, and she
Whom foure new coming, and foure parting Suns
Had found, and left the Mandrakes tenant, runnes
Thoughtlesse of change, when her firme destiny
Confin’d, and enjayld her, that seem’d so free,
Into a smallblew shell, the which a poore
Warme bird orespread, and sat still evermore,
    Till her inclos’d child kickt, and pick’t it selfe a dore.

XIX.

Outcrept a sparrow, this soules moving Inne,
On whose raw armes stiffe feathers now begin,
As childrens teeth through gummes, to breake with paine,
His flesh is jelly yet, and his bones threds,
All a new downy mantle overspreads,
A mouth he opes, which would as much containe
As his late house, and the first houre speaks plaine,
And chirps alowd for meat.  Meat fit for men
His father steales for him, and so feeds then
    One, that within a moneth, will beate him from his hen.

XX.

In this worlds youth wise nature did make haste,
Things ripened sooner, and did longer last;
Already this hot cocke, in bush and tree
In field and tent oreflutters his next hen,
He asks her not, who did so last, nor when,
Nor if his sister, or his neece shee be;
Nor doth she pule for his inconstancie
If in her sight he change, nor doth refuse
The next that calls; both liberty doe use,
    Where store is of both kindes, both kindes may freely chuse.

XXI.

Men, till they tooke laws which made freedome lesse,
Their daughters, and their sisters did ingress;
Till now unlawfull, therefore ill, ‘twas not.
So jolly, that it can move, this soule is,
The body so free of his kindnesses,
That selfe preserving it hath now forgot,
And slackneth so the soules, and bodies knot,
Which temperance streightens;  freely on his she friends
He blood, and spirit, pith, and marrow spends,
    Ill steward of himself, himselfe in three years ends.

XXII.

Else might he long have liv’d; man did not know
Of gummie blood, which doth in holly grow,
How to make bird-lime, nor how to deceive
With faind calls, hid nets, or enwrapping snare
The free inhabitants of the Plyant aire.
Man to beget, and woman to conceive
Askt not of rootes, nor of cock-sparrowes, leave:
Yet chuseth hee, though none of these he feares,
Pleasantly three, than streightned twenty yeares
    To live, and to encrease his race, himselfe outweares.

XXIII.

This cole with overblowing quench’d and dead,
The Soule from her too active organs fled
T’a brooke.  A female fishes sandie Roe
With the males jelly, newly lev’ned was,
For they had intertouch’d as they did passe,
And one of those small bodies, fitted so,
This soule inform’d, and abled it to rowe
It selfe with finnie oares, which she did fit:
Her scales seem’d yet of parchment, and as yet
    Perchance a fish, but by no name you could call it.

XXIV.

When goodly, like a ship in her full trim,
A swan, so white that you may unto him
Compare all whitenesse, but himselfe to none,
Glided along, and as he glided watch’d,
And with his arched necke this poore fish catch’d.
It mov’d with state, as if to looke upon
Low things it scorn’d, and yet before that one
Could thinke he sought it, he had swallowed cleare
This, and much such, and unblam’d devour’d there
    All, but who too swift, too great, or well arm’d were.

XXV.

Now swome a prison in a prison put,
And now this Soule in double walls was shut,
Till melted with the Swans digestive fire,
She left her house the fish, and vapour’d forth;
Fate not affording bodies of more worth
For her as yet, bids her againe retire
T’another fish, to any new desire
Made a new prey; For, he that can to none
Resistance make, nor complaint, sure is gone.
    Weaknesse invites, but silence feasts oppression.

XXVI.

Pace with her native streame, this fish doth keepe,
And journeyes with her, towards the glassie deepe,
But oft retarded, once with a hidden net
Though with greate windowes, for when Need first taught
These tricks to catch food, then they were not wrought
As now, with curious greedinesse to let
None scape, but few, and fit for use, to get,
As, in this trap a ravenous pike was tane,
Who, though himselfe distrest, would faine have slain
    This wretch; So hardly are ill habits left again.

XXVII.

Here by her smallnesse shee two deaths orepast,
Once innocence scap’d, and left the oppressor fast.
The net through-swome, she keepes the liquid path,
And whether she leape up sometimes to breath
And suck in aire, or find it underneath,
Or working parts like mills or limbecks hath
To make the water thinne and airelike, faith
Cares not; but safe the Place she’s come unto
Where fresh, with salt waves meet, and what to doe
    She knowes not, but betweene both makes a boord or two.

XXVIII.

So farre from hiding her guests, water is,
That she showes them in bigger quantities
Then they are.  Thus doubtfull of her way,
For game and not for hunger a sea Pie
Spied through this traitorous spectacle, from high,
The seely fish where it disputing lay,
And t’end her doubts and her, beares her away,
Exhalted she’is, but to the exhalters good,
As are by great ones, men which lowly stood.
    It’s rais’d, to be the Raisers instrument and food.

XXIX.

Is any kinde subject to rape like fish? 
Ill unto man, they neither doe, nor wish:
Fishers they kill not, nor with noise awake,
They doe not hunt, nor strive to make a prey
Of beasts, nor their yong sonnes to beare away;
Foules they pursue not, nor do undertake
To spoile the nests industrious birds do make;
Yet them all these unkinde kinds feed upon,
To kill them is an occupation,
    And lawes make fasts, and lents for their destruction.

XXX.

A sudden stiffe land-winde in that selfe houre
To sea-ward forc’d this bird, that did devour
The fish; he cares not, for with ease he flies,
Fat gluttonies best orator: at last
So long hee hath flowen, and hath flowen so fast
That leagues o’er-past at sea, now tir’d hee lyes,
And with his prey, that till then languisht, dies,
The soules no longer foes, two wayes did erre,
The fish I follow, and keepe no calender
    Of the other; he lives yet in some great officer.

XXXI.

Into an embrion fish, our Soule is throwne,
And in due time throwne out againe, and growne
To such vastnesse, as if unmanacled
From Greece, Morea were, and that by some
Earthquake unrooted, loose Morea swome,
Or seas from Africks body had severed
And torne the hopefull Promontories head,
This fish would seeme these, and, when all hopes faile,
A great ship overset, or without saile
    Hulling, might (when this was a whelp) be like this whale.

XXXII.

At every stroake his brazen finnes do take,
More circles in the broken sea they make
Then cannons voices, when the aire they teare:
His ribs are pillars, and his high arch’d roofe
Of barke that blunts best steele, is thunder-proofe:
Swimme in him swallowed Dolphins, without feare,
And feele no sides, as if his vast wombe were
Some inland sea, and ever as hee went
He spouted rivers up, as if he ment
    To joyne our seas, with seas above the firmament.

XXXIII.

He hunts not fish, but as an officer,
Stayes in his court, at his owne net, and there
All suitors of all sorts themselves enthrall;
So on his backe lyes this whale wantoning,
And in his gulfe-like throat, sucks every thing
That passeth neare.  Fish chaseth fish, and all,
Flyer and follower, in this whirlepoole fall;
O might not states of more equality
Consist? and is it of necessity
    That thousand guiltlesse smals, to make one great, must die?

XXXIV.

Now drinkes he up seas, and he eates up flocks,
He justles Ilands, and he shakes firme rockes.
Now in a roomefull house this Soule doth float,
And like a Prince she sends her faculties
To all her limbes, distant as Provinces.
The Sunne hath twenty times both crab and goate
Parched, since first lanch’d forth this living boate,
‘Tis greatest now, and to destruction
Nearest; There’s no pause at perfection,
    Greatenesse a period hath, but hath no station.

XXXV.

Two little fishes whom hee never harm’d,
Nor fed on their kinde, two not thoroughly arm’d
With hope that they could kill him, nor could doe
Good to themselves by his death (they did not eate
His flesh, nor suck those oyles, which thence outstreat)
Conspir’d against him, and it might undoe
The plot of all, that the plotters were two,
But that they fishes were, and could not speake.
How shall a Tyran wise strong projects breake,
    If wreches can on them the common anger wreake?

XXXVI.

The flaile-finn’d Thresher, and steel-beak’d Sword-fish
Onely attempt to doe, what all doe wish.
The Thresher backs him, and to beate begins;
The sluggard Whale yeelds to oppression,
And t’hide himselfe from shame and danger, downe
Begins to sinke; the Swordfish upward spins,
And gores him with his beake; his staffe-like finnes,
So well the one, his sword the other plyes,
That now a scoffe, and prey, this tyran dyes,
    And (his owne dole) feeds with himselfe all companies.

XXXVII.

Who will revenge his death? or who will call
Those to account, that thought, and wrought his fall?
The heires of slaine kings, wee see are often so
Transported with the joy of what they get,
That they, revenge and obsequies forget,
Nor will against such men the people goe,
Because h’is now dead, to whom they should show
Love in that act.  Some kings by vice being growne
So needy of subjects love, that of their own
    They thinke they lose, if love be to the dead Prince showne.

XXXVIII.

This Soule, now free from prison, and passion,
Hath yet a little indignation
That so small hammers should so soone downe beat
So great a castle.  And having for her house
Got the streight cloyster of a wreched mouse
(As basest men that have not what to eate,
Nor enjoy ought, doe farre more hate the great
Then they, who good repos’d estates possesse)
This Soule, late taught that great things might by lesse
    Be slaine, to gallant mischiefe doth herself addresse.