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Quotes from Poems — John Donne

1572–1631 England

← All quotes by John Donne

86 quotes

Take me to you, imprison me, for I
Except you enthral me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

Poems (1633)

And dare love that, and say so too,
And forget the He and She.

Poems (1633)

She, and comparisons are odious.

Poems (1633)

For if one eat my meat, though it be known
The meat was mine, th'excrement is his own.

Poems (1633)

The straight Hellespont between
The Sestos and Abydos of her breasts
Not of two lovers, but two loves the nests.

Poems (1633)

Send home my long strayed eyes to me,
Which (Oh) too long have dwelt on thee.

Poems (1633)

The heavens rejoice in motion, why should I
Abjure my so much loved variety.

Poems (1633)

I am two fools, I know,
For loving, and for saying so
In whining poetry.

Poems (1633)

Who ever loves, if he do not propose
The right true end of love, he's one that goes
To sea for nothing but to make him sick.

Poems (1633)

Thy firmness makes my circle just,
And makes me end, where I begun.

Poems (1633)

When I died last, and dear, I die
As often as from thee I go.

Poems (1633)

Oh wrangling schools, that search what fire
Shall burn this world, had none the wit
Unto this knowledge to aspire,
That this her fever might be it?

Poems (1633)

But he who loveliness within
Hath found, all outward loathes,
For he who color loves, and skin,
Loves but their oldest clothes.

Poems (1633)

If they be two, they are two so
As stiff twin compasses are two,
Thy soul the fixed foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if the other do.

Poems (1633)

At the round earth's imagin'd corners, blow
Your trumpets, angels, and arise, arise
From death, you numberless infinities
Of souls, and to your scattered bodies go.

Poems (1633)

Thou'rt slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell;
And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well
And better than thy stroke.

Poems (1633)

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so,
For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

Poems (1633)

Nurse, O! my love is slain; I saw him go
O'er the white Alps alone; I saw him, I,
Assail'd, fight, taken, stabb'd, bleed, fall, and die.

Poems (1633)

She is all states, and all princes, I,
Nothing else is.
Princes do but play us; compared to this,
All honour’s mimic, all wealth alchemy.

Poems (1633)

Ah cannot we
As well as cocks and lions jocund be,
After such pleasures?

Poems (1633)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: John Donne (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.