Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share Episode 107: John Donne, The Sun Rising
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
Episode 107: John Donne, The Sun Rising
This episode begins a three-part series on the "aubade," a poem to greet the morning (often by wishing the morning away). We discuss Donne's many wonderful techniques and even recite a little Romeo and Juliet.
Here is the poem:
The Sun Rising
By John Donne
Busy old fool, unruly sun,
Why dost thou thus,
Through windows, and through curtains call on us?
Must to thy motions lovers' seasons run?
Saucy pedantic wretch, go chide
Late school boys and sour prentices,
Go tell court huntsmen that the king will ride,
Call country ants to harvest offices,
Love, all alike, no season knows nor clime,
Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.
Thy beams, so reverend and strong
Why shouldst thou think?
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink,
But that I would not lose her sight so long;
If her eyes have not blinded thine,
Look, and tomorrow late, tell me,
Whether both th' Indias of spice and mine
Be where thou leftst them, or lie here with me.
Ask for those kings whom thou saw'st yesterday,
And thou shalt hear, All here in one bed lay.
She's all states, and all princes, I,
Nothing else is.
Princes do but play us; compared to this,
All honor's mimic, all wealth alchemy.
Thou, sun, art half as happy as we,
In that the world's contracted thus.
Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
To warm the world, that's done in warming us.
Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere;
This bed thy center is, these walls, thy sphere.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44129/the-sun-rising
For more on Donne:
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/john-donne
View all episodes
By Joanne Diaz and Abram Van Engen
4.9
171171 ratings
This episode begins a three-part series on the "aubade," a poem to greet the morning (often by wishing the morning away). We discuss Donne's many wonderful techniques and even recite a little Romeo and Juliet.
Here is the poem:
The Sun Rising
By John Donne
Busy old fool, unruly sun,
Why dost thou thus,
Through windows, and through curtains call on us?
Must to thy motions lovers' seasons run?
Saucy pedantic wretch, go chide
Late school boys and sour prentices,
Go tell court huntsmen that the king will ride,
Call country ants to harvest offices,
Love, all alike, no season knows nor clime,
Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.
Thy beams, so reverend and strong
Why shouldst thou think?
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink,
But that I would not lose her sight so long;
If her eyes have not blinded thine,
Look, and tomorrow late, tell me,
Whether both th' Indias of spice and mine
Be where thou leftst them, or lie here with me.
Ask for those kings whom thou saw'st yesterday,
And thou shalt hear, All here in one bed lay.
She's all states, and all princes, I,
Nothing else is.
Princes do but play us; compared to this,
All honor's mimic, all wealth alchemy.
Thou, sun, art half as happy as we,
In that the world's contracted thus.
Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
To warm the world, that's done in warming us.
Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere;
This bed thy center is, these walls, thy sphere.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44129/the-sun-rising
For more on Donne:
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/john-donne
More shows like Poetry For All
View all
The New Yorker Radio Hour
6,826 Listeners
The New Yorker: Fiction
3,329 Listeners
The Book Review
3,970 Listeners
Poetry Off the Shelf
440 Listeners
The New Yorker: Poetry
522 Listeners
Between The Covers : Conversations with Writers in Fiction, Nonfiction & Poetry
473 Listeners
On Being with Krista Tippett
10,193 Listeners
The New Yorker: The Writer's Voice - New Fiction from The New Yorker
2,118 Listeners
London Review Bookshop Podcast
135 Listeners
Emergence Magazine Podcast
510 Listeners
The Daily Poem
742 Listeners
The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily
1,214 Listeners
Poetry Unbound
3,590 Listeners
The Ezra Klein Show
15,950 Listeners
Close Readings
86 Listeners