{
 "id": "john-donne/epithalamion-made-at-lincolns-inn",
 "title": "Epithalamion Made at Lincoln’s Inn",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "John Donne",
 "poet_slug": "john-donne",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poems, by J. D. with Elegies on the Authors Death",
 "book_slug": "poems-1633",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": "Epithalamions, or Marriage Songs",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1633,
  "venue": "Poems, by J. D. with Elegies on the Authors Death (1633)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/donnepoems"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/john-donne_poetry",
  "file": "epithalamions-or-marriage-songs.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsofjohndonne01donn_1",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemswithelegie00chamgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemswithelegie01chamgoog"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 96,
  "n_stanzas": 8,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 55,
  "max_indent": 2
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "The sunbeams in the east are spread;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Leave, leave, fair bride, your solitary bed;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "No more shall you return to it alone;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "It nurseth sadness, and your body’s print,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like to a grave, the yielding down doth dint;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You, and your other you, meet there anon.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Put forth, put forth, that warm balm-breathing thigh,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Which when next time you in these sheets will smother,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There it must meet another,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Which never was, but must be, oft, more nigh.",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Come glad from thence, go gladder than you came;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Today put on perfection, and a woman’s name.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Daughters of London, you which be",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our golden mines, and furnish’d treasury;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You which are angels, yet still bring with you",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Thousands of angels on your marriage days;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Help with your presence, and devise to praise",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "These rites, which also unto you grow due;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Conceitedly dress her, and be assign’d",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "By you fit place for every flower and jewel;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Make her for love fit fuel,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "As gay as Flora and as rich as Ind;",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "So may she, fair and rich, in nothing lame,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Today put on perfection, and a woman’s name.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And you frolic patricians,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sons of those senators, wealth’s deep oceans;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ye painted courtiers, barrels of other’s wits;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Ye countrymen, who but your beasts love none;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ye of those fellowships, whereof he’s one,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of study and play made strange hermaphrodites,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Here shine; this bridegroom to the temple bring.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Lo, in yon path which store of strew’d flowers graceth,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The sober virgin paceth;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Except my sight fail, ’tis no other thing.",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Weep not, nor blush, here is no grief nor shame,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Today put on perfection, and a woman’s name.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Thy two-leaved gates, fair temple, unfold,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And these two in thy sacred bosom hold,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till mystically join’d but one they be;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Then may thy lean and hunger-starvèd womb",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Long time expect their bodies, and their tomb,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Long after their own parents fatten thee.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "All elder claims, and all cold barrenness,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "All yielding to new loves, be far forever,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which might these two dissever;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Always, all th’other may each one possess;",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "For the best bride, best worthy of praise and fame,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Today puts on perfection, and a woman’s name.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Winter days bring much delight,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not for themselves, but for they soon bring night;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Other sweets wait thee than these diverse meats,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Other disports than dancing jollities,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Other love-tricks than glancing with the eyes,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But that the sun still in our half sphere sweats;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "He flies in winter, but he now stands still.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet shadows turn; noon point he hath attain’d;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His steeds will be restrain’d,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But gallop lively down the western hill.",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou shalt, when he hath run the heaven’s half frame,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tonight put on perfection, and a woman’s name.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The amorous evening star is rose,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Why then should not our amorous star enclose",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Herself in her wish’d bed? Release your strings,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Musicians; and dancers take some truce",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With these your pleasing labours, for great use",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As much weariness as perfection brings.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "You, and not only you, but all toil’d beasts",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Rest duly; at night all their toils are dispensed;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But in their beds commenced",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Are other labours, and more dainty feasts.",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "She goes a maid, who, lest she turn the same,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tonight puts on perfection, and a woman’s name.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Thy virgin’s girdle now untie,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And in thy nuptial bed, love’s altar, lie",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A pleasing sacrifice; now dispossess",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Thee of these chains and robes, which were put on",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To adorn the day, not thee; for thou, alone,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like virtue and truth, art best in nakedness.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "This bed is only to virginity",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "A grave, but to a better state, a cradle.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till now thou wast but able",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To be, what now thou art; then, that by thee",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "No more be said, “I may be,” but “I am,”",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tonight put on perfection, and a woman’s name.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Even like a faithful man content,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That this life for a better should be spent,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So she a mother’s rich stile doth prefer,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And at the bridegroom’s wish’d approach doth lie,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like an appointed lamb, when tenderly",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The priest comes on his knees, to embowel her.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Now sleep or watch with more joy; and, O light",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Of heaven, tomorrow rise thou hot, and early;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This sun will love so dearly",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Her rest, that long, long we shall want her sight.",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Wonders are wrought, for she, which had no maim,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tonight puts on perfection, and a woman’s name.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}