{"id":212,"date":"2010-06-22T07:57:17","date_gmt":"2010-06-21T19:57:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=212"},"modified":"2010-06-22T08:03:25","modified_gmt":"2010-06-21T20:03:25","slug":"tuesday-poem-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2010\/06\/22\/tuesday-poem-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Tuesday Poem\u2014A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>John Donne 1571-1631<br \/>\n<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A<span>s<\/span> virtuous men passe mildly away,<br \/>\nAnd whisper to their soules to goe,<br \/>\nWhilst some of their sad friends doe say,<br \/>\n&#8220;The breath goes now,&#8221; and some say, no:<\/p>\n<p>So let us melt, and make no noise,<br \/>\nNo teare-floods, nor sigh-tempests move,<br \/>\n&#8216;Twere prophanation of our joyes<br \/>\nTo tell the layetie our love.<\/p>\n<p>Moving of th&#8217; earth brings harmes and fears,<br \/>\nMen reckon what it did and meant,<br \/>\nBut trepidation of the spheres,<br \/>\nThough greater farre, is innocent.<\/p>\n<p>Dull sublunary lovers&#8217; love<br \/>\n(Whose soule is sense) cannot admit<br \/>\nAbsence, because it doth remove<br \/>\nThose things which elemented it.<\/p>\n<p>But we by a love, so much refin&#8217;d,<br \/>\nThat our selves know not what it is,<br \/>\nInter-assured of the mind,<br \/>\nCare lesse, eyes, lips, and hands to misse.<\/p>\n<p>Our two soules therefore, which are one,<br \/>\nThough I must goe, endure not yet<br \/>\nA breach, but an expansion,<br \/>\nLike gold to ayery thinness beate.<\/p>\n<p>If they be two, they are two so<br \/>\nAs stiffe twin compasses are two,<br \/>\nThy soule the fixt foot, makes no show<br \/>\nTo move, but doth, if th&#8217; other doe.<\/p>\n<p>And though it in the center sit,<br \/>\nYet when the other far doth rome,<br \/>\nIt leanes, and hearkens after it,<br \/>\nAnd growes erect, as that comes home.<\/p>\n<p>Such wilt thou be to mee, who must<br \/>\nLike th&#8217; other foot, obliquely runne;<br \/>\nThy firmnes drawes my circle just,<br \/>\nAnd makes me end, where I begunne.<\/p>\n<p>Source: Donne, J., <em>Selected Poems of John Donne, <\/em>Reeves, J. ed, Heinemann Ltd, London, 1952<\/p>\n<p>I have always loved the poetry of John Donne: the wealth and cleverness of his language; the extravagant intermingling of the profane and divine in his poetic imagery, juxtaposed with the taut discipline of poetic form&#8211;as well as Donne&#8217;s ability to springboard the reader into larger awareness through the use of a motif, such as the compass in this poem, which is mundane and everyday. I particularly like this poem,<em> A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning<\/em>, because although it displays all his hallmark cleverness, or wit, these cerebral qualities are balanced by tenderness and real depth of emotional feeling.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning John Donne 1571-1631 As virtuous men passe mildly away, And whisper to their soules to goe, Whilst some of their sad friends doe say, &#8220;The breath goes now,&#8221; and some say, no: So let us melt, and make no noise, No teare-floods, nor sigh-tempests move, &#8216;Twere prophanation of our joyes To [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=212"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":215,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212\/revisions\/215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}