| John Donne (1572–1631). The Poems of John Donne. 1896. | | | Divine Poems
Holy Sonnets | | IV. “O, my black soul, now thou art summoned” |
| | | O, MY black soul, now thou art summoned | |
| By sickness, Death’s herald and champion; | |
| Thou’rt like a pilgrim, which abroad hath done | |
| Treason, and durst not turn to whence he’s fled; | |
| Or like a thief, which till death’s doom be read, | 5 |
| Wisheth himself deliver’d from prison, | |
| But damn’d and haled to execution, | |
| Wisheth that still he might be imprisoned. | |
| Yet grace, if thou repent, thou canst not lack; | |
| But who shall give thee that grace to begin? | 10 |
| O, make thyself with holy mourning black, | |
| And red with blushing, as thou art with sin; | |
| Or wash thee in Christ’s blood, which hath this might, | |
| That being red, it dyes red souls to white. | | | | |
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