"The Extasie" John Donne John O'Brien Transcription, correction, editorial commentary, and markup Students and Staff of the University of Virginia Rachel Retica National Endowment for the Humanities Literature in Context
University of Virginia Department of English P. O. Box 400121 Charlottesville, VA 22904-4121 jobrien@virginia.edu lic.open.anthology@gmail.com
Published by Literature in Context under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 Unported License "The Extasie" John Donne Poems, by J. D., With Elegies on the Authors Death London M. F. for John Marriot 1633 We have taken our text from the Text Creation Partnership's digitized version of the 1633 edition of Donne's poems: https://github.com/textcreationpartnership/A69225/blob/master/A69225.xml. Donne's poems circulated in manuscript during his life time, and were not issued in a print version until this edition, which came out after Donne's death in 1632. The long "s" of the original has been modernized, but we have otherwise kept the original spelling. The title page has been sourced from Princeton University Special Collections. 200 English print single poem London, England

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Original spelling and capitalization is retained, though the long s has been silently modernized and ligatured forms are not encoded.

Hyphenation has not been retained, except where necessary for the sense of the word.

Page breaks have been retained. Catchwords, signatures, and running headers have not.

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 Numbered divs used. Library of Congress Name Authority File Library of Congress Classification Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names Open Researcher and Contributor ID Rachel Retica created LIC edition. POEMS, By J. D[onne].WITHELEGIESON THE AUTHOR'SDeath. LONDON. Printed by M. F. for [J]OHN MARRIOT,and are to be sold at his shop in St Dunstans Church-yard in Fleet-street. 1633.
The Extasie. WHere, like a pillow on a bed, A Pregnant banke swel'd up, to rest The violets reclining head, Sat we two, one anothers best; Our hands were firmely cimented With a fast balme, which thence did spring, Our eye-beames twisted, and did thred Our eyes, upon one double string, So to'entergraft our hands, as yet Was all the meanes to make us one, And pictures in our eyes to get Was all our propagation. As 'twixt two equall Armies, Fate Suspends uncertaine victorie, Our soules, (which to advance their state, Were gone out,) hung 'twixt her, and mee. And whil'st our soules negotiate there, Wee like sepulchrall statues lay, All day, the same our postures were, And wee said nothing, all the day. If any, so by love refin'd, That he soules language understood, And by good love were growen all minde, Within convenient distance stood, He (though he knowes not which soule spake, Because both meant, both spake the same) Might thence a new concoction take, And part farre purer then he came. This Extasie doth unperplex (We said) and tell us what we love, Wee see by this, it was not sexe Wee see, we saw not what did move: But as all severall soules containe Mixture of things, they know not what, Love, these mixt soules, doth mixe againe, And makes both one, each this and that. A single violet transplant, The strength, the colour, and the size, (All which before was poore, and scant,) Redoubles still, and multiplies. When love, with one another so Interanimates two soules, That abler soule, which thence doth flow, Defects of lonelinesse controules. Wee then, who are this new soule, know, Of what we are compos'd, and made, For, th'Atomies of which we grow, Are soules, whom no change can invade. But O alas, so long, so farre Our bodies why doe wee forbeare? They are ours, though not wee, Wee are The intelligences, they the spheares. We owe them thankes, because they thus, Did us, to us, at first convay, Yeelded their senses force to us, Nor are drosse to us, but allay. On man heavens influence workes not so, But that it first imprints the ayre, For soule into the soule may flow, Though it to body first repaire. As our blood labours to beget Spirits, as like soules as it can, Because such fingers need to knit That subtile knot, which makes us man: So must pure lovers soules descend T'affections, and to faculties, Which sense may reach and apprehend, Else a great Prince in prison lies. To'our bodies turne wee then, that so Weake men on love reveal'd may looke; Loves mysteries in soules doe grow, But yet the body is his booke. And if some lover, such as wee, Have heard this dialogue of one, Let him still marke us, he shall see Small change, when we'are to bodies gone.