John Donne: Quotes about love

John Donne was English poet. Explore interesting quotes on love.

John Donne: 230 quotes28 likes

“But he who loveliness within
Hath found, all outward loathes,
For he who color loves, and skin,
Loves but their oldest clothes.”

The Undertaking, stanza 4

“And dare love that, and say so too,
And forget the He and She.”

The Undertaking, stanza 5

“All Kings, and all their favorites,
All glory of honors, beauties, wits
The sun itself, which makes times, as they pass,
Is elder by a year, now, than it was
When thou and I first one another saw:
All other things, to their destruction draw,
Only our love hath no decay;
This, no tomorrow hath, nor yesterday,
Running, it never runs from us away,
But truly keeps his first, last, everlasting day.”

The Anniversary, stanza 1

“Who ever loves, if he do not propose
The right true end of love, he's one that goes
To sea for nothing but to make him sick.”

No. 18, Love's Progress, line 1
Elegies

“Sweetest love, I do not go,
For weariness of thee,
Nor in hope the world can show
A fitter love for me;
But since that I
Must die at last, 'tis best,
To use my self in jest
Thus by feigned deaths to die.”

Song (Sweetest Love, I Do Not Go), stanza 1

“The Sestos and Abydos of her breasts
Not of two lovers, but two loves the nests.”

No. 18, Love's Progress, line 61
Elegies

“Nature's lay idiot, I taught thee to love.”

No. 7, Natures Lay Idiot, line 1
Elegies

“Take heed of loving me.”

The Prohibition, stanza 1

“I wonder, by my troth, what thou and I
Did, till we loved? Were we not weaned till then?
But sucked on country pleasures, childishly?
Or snorted we in the Seven Sleepers’ den?
’Twas so; but this, all pleasures fancies be.
If ever any beauty I did see,
Which I desired, and got, ’twas but a dream of thee.

And now good-morrow to our waking souls,
Which watch not one another out of fear;
For love, all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room an everywhere.
Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone,
Let maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown,
Let us possess one world, each hath one, and is one.

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,
And true plain hearts do in the faces rest;
Where can we find two better hemispheres,
Without sharp north, without declining west?
Whatever dies, was not mixed equally;
If our two loves be one, or, thou and I
Love so alike, that none do slacken, none can die.”

John Donne Songs and Sonnets

Songs and Sonnets (1633), The Good-Morrow