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Elegy XVI: On His Mistress

 By our first strange and fatal interview,
By all desires which thereof did ensue,
By our long starving hopes, by that remorse
Which my words' masculine persuasive force
Begot in thee, and by the memory
Of hurts, which spies and rivals threatened me,
I calmly beg: but by thy father's wrath,
By all pains, which want and divorcement hath,
I conjure thee, and all the oaths which I
And thou have sworn to seal joint constancy,
Here I unswear, and overswear them thus,
Thou shalt not love by ways so dangerous.
Temper, O fair Love, love's impetuous rage, Be my true Mistress still, not my feigned Page; I'll go, and, by thy kind leave, leave behind Thee, only worthy to nurse in my mind Thirst to come back; O if thou die before, My soul from other lands to thee shall soar.
Thy (else Almighty) beauty cannot move Rage from the Seas, nor thy love teach them love, Nor tame wild Boreas' harshness; thou hast read How roughly he in pieces shivered Fair Orithea, wbom he swore he loved.
Fall ill or good, 'tis madness to have proved Dangers unurged; feed on this flattery, That absent Lovers one in th' other be.
Dissemble nothing, not a boy, nor change Thy body's habit, nor mind's; be not strange To thyself only; all will spy in thy face A blushing womanly discovering grace; Ricbly clothed Apes are called Apes, and as soon Eclipsed as bright we call the Moon the Moon.
Men of France, changeable chameleons, Spitals of diseases, shops of fashions, Love's fuellers, and the rightest company Of Players, which upon the world's stage be, Will quickly know thee, and no less, alas! Th' indifferent Italian, as we pass His warm land, well content to think thee Page, Will hunt thee with such lust, and hideous rage, As Lot's fair guests were vexed.
But none of these Nor spongy hydroptic Dutch shall thee displease, If thou stay here.
O stay here, for, for thee England is only a worthy gallery, To walk in expectation, till from thence Our greatest King call thee to his presence.
When I am gone, dream me some happiness, Nor let thy looks our long-hid love confess, Nor praise, nor dispraise me, nor bless nor curse Openly love's force, nor in bed fright thy Nurse With midnight's startings, crying out—oh, oh Nurse, O my love is slain, I saw him go O'er the white Alps alone; I saw him, I, Assailed, fight, taken, stabbed, bleed, fall, and die.
Augur me better chance, except dread Jove Think it enough for me t' have had thy love.

Poem by John Donne
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Book: Shattered Sighs