Planted by Water

I posted something about Norman Kember’s release last week and I noticed that there has been a debate about it on Roger Aubrey’s blog. So if people are still interested about that there is an interesting article about it a LICC this week.

But I felt it had been too long since I had posted a poem on my blog. I get far too little times these days to read poetry, so this makes me do it. This is one of my favoutires, from seventeenth-century Christian poet, John Donne. If you can get over the old spellings and form, you can see that this is a great celebration of victory over death:

DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee  
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,  
For, those, whom thou think’st, thou dost overthrow,  
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.  
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,         
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,  
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,  
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.  
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,  
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,  
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,  
And better then thy stroake; why swell’st thou then;  
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,  
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.