His reputation went in front of him
carrying a red flag
I couldn't be certain of his bowed head
or even what he had meant it to be
But at first glance he had said
it's not easy fighting the twentieth century
I wanted to wash more than anything
You fool yourselves you are writers
You fool yourselves you are tellers of tales
I take apart what you put together
I stood somewhere between
the passing of the deed
and his dreadful motion.
He stood as only a dead man could
Oh do not die, for I shall hate
All women so , when thou art gone,
That thee I shall not celebrate,
When I remember, thou wast one.
But yet thou canst not die, I know,
To leave this world behind, is death,
But when thou from this world wilt go,
The whole world vapours with thy breath.
Or iff, when thou, the world's soul go'st,
It stay, tis but thy carcase then,
The fairest woman, but thy ghost,
But corrupt worms, the worthiest men.
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?
And yet she cannot waste by this,
Nor long bear this torturing wrong,
For much corruption needful is
To fuel such a fever long.
These burning fits but meteors be,
Whose matter in thee is soon spent.
Thy beauty, and all parts, which are theee,
Are unchangeable firmament.
Yet 'twas of my mind, seizing thee,
Though it in thee cannot persever.
For I had rather owner be
Of thee one hour, than all else ever.
As virtuous men pass mildly away,
And whisper to their souls, to go,
Whilst some of their sad friends do say,
The breath goes now, and some say, no:
So let us melt, and make no noise,
No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move,
'Twere profanation of our joys
To tell the laity our love.
Moving of th'earth brings harms and fears,
Men reckon what it did and meant,
But trepidation of the spheres,
Though greater far, is innocent.
Dull sublunary lovers' love
(Whole soul is sense) cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
Those things which elemented it.
But we by a love, so much refined,
That our selves know not what it is,
Inter-assured of the mind,
Care less, eyes, lips, and hands to miss.
Our two souls therefore, which are one,
Though I must go, endure not yet
A breach, but expansion,
Like gold to aery thinnest beat.
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 th'other do.
And though it in the centre sit,
Yet when the other far doth roam,
It leans, and harkens after it,
And grows erect, as that comes home.
Such wilt thou be to me, who must
Like th'other foot, obliquely run;
Thy firmness makes my circle just
And makes me end, where I began,
John Donne