By John Donne
Introduction by Eric Cook
I have been reading Donne ever since my wife and I made A Valediction Forbidding Mourning our go-to when we were long-distance dating. I just started rereading John Donne: The Reformed Soul, the excellent biography by John Stubbs.
A Hymn to God the Father, below, is a beautiful piece. The brilliant and moving part of this poem, however, as Stubbs points out, “is the interplay between the puns on his own name, ‘done’, and on the maiden name of his wife Ann, ‘more’. God can only have Donne when Donne no longer has More; and while fearing no more, Donne is not quite prepared to give her up.” This is one of Donne’s favorites, which is saying a lot given the other brilliant works he wrote. Enjoy!
A Hymn to God the Father
Wilt thou forgive that sin where I begun,
Which was my sin, though it were done before?
Wilt thou forgive that sin, through which I run,
And do run still, though still I do deplore?
When thou hast done, thou hast not done,
For I have more.
Wilt thou forgive that sin which I have won
Others to sin, and made my sin their door?
Wilt thou forgive that sin which I did shun
A year or two, but wallow’d in, a score?
When thou hast done, thou hast not done,
For I have more.
I have a sin of fear, that when I have spun
My last thread, I shall perish on the shore;
But swear by thyself, that at my death thy Son
Shall shine as he shines now, and heretofore;
And, having done that, thou hast done;
I fear no more.
