The Complete English Poems

No poet has been more wilfully contradictory than John Donne, whose works forge unforgettable connections between extremes of passion and mental energy. From satire to tender elegy, from sacred devotion to lust, he conveys an astonishing range of emotions and poetic moods. Constant in his work, however, is an intensity of feeling and expression and complexity of argument that is as evident in religious meditations such as 'Good Friday 1613. Riding Westward' as it is in secular love poems such as 'The Sun Rising' or 'The Flea'. 'The intricacy and subtlety of his imagination are the length and depth of the furrow made by his passion,' wrote Yeats, pinpointing the unique genius of a poet who combined ardour and intellect in equal measure.

Table of Contents:
The Complete English PoemsPreface Table of Dates Further Reading A Note on the Metre Songs and Sonnets Air and Angels The Anniversary The Apparition The Bait The Blossom Break of Day The Broken Heart The Canonization Community The Computation Confined Love The Curse The Damp The Dissolution The Dream The Ecstasy The Expiration Farewell to Love A Fever The Flea The Funeral The Good Morrow The Indifferent A Jet Ring Sent A Lecture upon the Shadow The Legacy Lovers' Infiniteness Love's Alchemy Love's Deity Love's Diet Love's Exchange Love's Growth Love's Usury The Message Negative Love A Nocturnal upon S. Lucy's Day The Paradox The Primrose The Prohibition The Relic Self Love Song (Go, and catch a falling star) Song (Sweetest love, I do not go) Sonnet. The Token The Sun Rising The Triple Fool Twicknam Garden The Undertaking A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning A Valediction: of the Book A Valediction: of my Name in the Window A Valediction: of Weeping The Will Witchcraft by a Picture Woman's Constancy Elegies 1. Jealousy 2. The Anagram 3. Change 4. The Perfume 5. His Picture 6. Oh, let me not serve so 7. Nature's lay idiot 8. The Comparison 9. The Autumnal 10. The Dream 11. The Bracelet 12. His Parting from Her 13. Julia 14. A Tale of a Citizen and his Wife 15. The Expostulation 16. On his Mistress 17. Variety 18. Love's Progress 19. To his Mistress Going to Bed 20. Love's War Sappho to Philaenis Epithalamions or Marriage Songs Epithalamion Made at Lincoln's Inn An Epithalamion, or Marriage Song on the Lady Elizabeth and Count Palatine being Married on St. Valentine's Day Eclogue 1613. December 26 Epithalamion Epigrams Hero and Leander Pyramus and Thisbe Niobe A Burnt Ship Fall of a Wall A Lame Beggar Cales and Guiana Sir John Wingfield A Self Accuser A Licentious Person Antiquary Disinherited Phryne An Obscure Writer Klockius Raderus Mercurius Gallo-Belgicus Ralphius The Liar Manliness Satires 1. Away thou fondling motley humourist 2. Sir; though (I thank God for it) I do hate 3. Kind pity chokes my spleen 4. Well; I may now receive, and die 5. Thou shalt not laugh in this leaf, Muse Upon Mr. Thoms Coryat's Crudities The Progress of the Soul (Metempsychosis) Verse Letters The Storm The Calm To Mr. B. B. To Mr. C. B. To Mr. S. B. To Mr. E. G. To Mr. I. L. (Blessed are your north parts) To Mr. I. L. (Of that short roll of friends) To Mr. R. W. (If, as mine is, thy life a slumber be) To Mr. R. W. (Kindly I envy thy song's perfection) To Mr. R. W. (Muse not that by thy mind thy body is led) To Mr. R. W. (Zealously my Muse doth salute all thee) To Mr. Rowland Woodward To Mr. T. W. (All hail, sweet poet) To Mr. T. W. (At once, from hence) To Mr. T. W. (Haste thee harsh verse) To Mr. T. W. (Pregnant again with th' old twins) To Sir Henry Goodyer A Letter Written by Sir H. G. and J. D. alternis vicibus To Sir Henry Wotton (Here's no more news) To Sir Henry Wotton (Sir, more than kisses) To Sir Henry Wotton, at his going Ambassador to Venice H. W. in Hibernia Belligeranti To Sir Edward Herbert, at Juliers To Mrs. M. H. To the Countess of Bedford at New Year's Tide To the Countess of Bedford (Honour is so sublime perfection) To the Countess of Bedford (Reason is our soul's left hand) To the Countess of Bedford (Though I be dead) To the Countess of Bedford (To have written then) To the Countess of Bedford (You have refined me) To the Lady Bedford Epitaph on Himself A Letter to the Lady Carey, and Mistress Essex Rich, from Amiens To the Countess of Huntingdon (Man to God's image) To the Countess of Huntingdon (That unripe side of earth) To the Countess of Salisbury Epicedes and Obsequies Elegy on the L. C. Elegy on the Lady Markham An Elegy upon the Death of Mistress Boulstred Elegy upon the Untimely Death of the Incomparable Prince Henry Obsequies to the Lord Harrington, Brother to the Lady Lucy, Countess of Bedford An Hymn to the Saints, and to Marquis Hamilton The Anniversaries An Anatomy of the World: The First Anniversary To the Praise of the Dead, and the Anatomy An Anatomy of the World A Funeral Elegy Of the Progress of the Soul: The Second Anniversary The Harbinger to the Progress Of the Progress of the Soul Divine Poems To E. of D. with Six Holy Sonnets To Mrs. Magdalen Herbert: of St. Mary Magdalen Holy Sonnets La Corona Divine Meditations 1. Thou hast made me 2. As due by many titles 3. O might those sighs and tears 4. Oh my black soul! 5. I am a little world 6. This is my play's last scene 7. At the round earth's imagined corners 8. If faithful souls be alike glorified 9. If poisonous minerals 10. Death be not proud 11. Spit in my face ye Jews 12. Whyare we by all creatures waited on? 13. What if this present were the world's last night? 14. Batter my heart, three-personed God 15. Wilt thou love God, as he thee? 16. Father, part of his double interest 17. Since she whom I loved 18. Show me dear Christ 19. Oh, to vex me A Litany The Cross Resurrection, imperfect Upon the Annunciation and Passion falling upon one day. 1608 Good Friday, 1613. Riding Westward To Mr. Tilman after he had taken orders Upon the Translation of the Psalms by Sir Philip Sidney, and the Countess of Pembroke his Sister The Lamentations of Jeremy, for the most part according to Tremellius A Hymn to Christ, at the Author's last going into Germany Hymn to God my God, in my Sickness A Hymn to God the Father Notes Index of Titles Index of First Lines

About the Author :
John Donne was born into a Catholic family in 1572. After a conventional education at Hart Hall, Oxford and Lincoln's Inn, he took part in the Earl of Essex's expedition to the Azores in 1597. He secretly married Anne More in December 1601 and was imprisoned by her father, Sir George, in the Fleet two months later. He was ordained priest in January 1615 and took a Doctorate of Divinity at Cambridge the same year. He was made Dean of St Paul's in London in 1621, a position he held until his death in 1631. He is famous for the sermons he preached in his later years, as well as for his poems. A.J. Smith was Professor Emeritus of the University of Southampton. His book include Literary Love (1983) and Metaphysical Wit (1992). He died in Salisbury in 1991.