A lover, burnt up by his affection, is compared to Egypt:
The fate of Egypt I sustain,
And never feel the dew of rain,
From clouds which in the head appear;
But all my too-much moisture ewe
To overflowings of the heart below.—Cowley.
The lover supposes his lady acquainted with the ancient laws of augury and rites of sacrifice:
And yet this death of mine, I fear,
Will ominous to her appear:
When, sound in every other part,
Her sacrifice is found without an heart.
For the last tempest of my death
Shall sigh out that too, with my breath.
That the chaos was harmonised, has been recited of old; but whence the different sounds arose remained for a modern to discover:
Th’ ungovern’d parts no correspondence knew;
An artless war from thwarting motions grew;
Till they to number and fixed rules were brought.
Water and air he for the tenor chose,
Earth made the base; the treble flame arose.—Cowley.
The tears of lovers are always of great poetical account; but Donne has extended them into worlds. If the lines are not easily understood, they may be read again:
On a round ball
A workman, that hath copies by, can lay
An Europe, Afric, and an Asia,
And quickly make that which was nothing, all.
So doth each tear,
Which thee doth wear,
A globe, yea world, by that impression grow,
Till thy tears mixed with mine do overflow
This world, by waters sent from thee my heaven dissolved so.
On reading the following lines, the reader may perhaps cry out “Confusion worse confounded.”
Hers lies a she sun, and a he moon here,
She gives the best light to his sphere,
Or each is both, and all, and so,
They unto one another nothing owe.—Donne.