Farewell to Love

by John Donne

　　I thought there was some deity in love,

　　 So did I reverence, and gave

　　Worship; as atheists at their dying hour

　　Call, what they cannot name, an unknown power,

　　 As ignorantly did I crave.

　　  Thus when

　　Things not yet known are coveted by men,

　　 Our desires give them fashion, and so

　　As they wax lesser, fall, as they size, grow.

　　 But, from late fair,

　　His highness sitting in a golden chair,

　　 Is not less cared for after three days

　　By children, than the thing which lovers so

　　Blindly admire, and with such worship woo;

　　 Being had, enjoying it decays;

　　  And thence,

　　What before pleased them all, takes but one sense,

　　And that so lamely, as it leaves behind

　　A kind of sorrowing dulness to the mind.

　　 Ah cannot we,

　　As well as cocks and lions, jocund be

　　 After such pleasures, unless wise

　　Nature decreed—since each such act, they say,

　　Diminisheth the length of life a day—

　　 This; as she would man should despise

　　  The sport,

　　Because that other curse of being short,

　　 And only for a minute made to be

　　Eager, desires to raise posterity.

　　 Since so, my mind

　　Shall not desire what no man else can find;

　　 I'll no more dote and run

　　To pursue things which had endamaged me;

　　And when I come where moving beauties be,

　　 As men do when the summer's sun

　　  Grows great,

　　Though I admire their greatness, shun their heat.

　　 Each place can afford shadows; if all fail,

　　'Tis but applying worm-seed to the tail.