[lit-ideas] Re: Galaxy in Donne

  • From: "Andreas Ramos" <andreas@xxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: "Lit-Ideas" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 11:07:25 -0700

UPON this Primrose hill, 
Where, if heaven would distil 
A shower of rain, each several drop might go 
To his own primrose, and grow manna so ; 
And where their form, and their infinity 
Make a terrestrial galaxy, 
As the small stars do in the sky ; 
I walk to find a true love ; and I see 
That 'tis not a mere woman, that is she, 
But must or more or less than woman be. 

 Yet know I not, which flower 
I wish ; a six, or four ; 
For should my true-love less than woman be, 
She were scarce anything ; and then, should she 
Be more than woman, she would get above 
All thought of sex, and think to move 
My heart to study her, and not to love. 
Both these were monsters ; since there must reside 
Falsehood in woman, I could more abide, 
She were by art, than nature falsified. 

Live, primrose, then, and thrive 
With thy true number five ; 
And, woman, whom this flower doth represent, 
With this mysterious number be content ; 
Ten is the farthest number ; if half ten 
Belongs to each woman, then 
Each woman may take half us men ; 
Or-if this will not serve their turn-since all 
Numbers are odd, or even, and they fall 
First into five, women may take us all. 


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