Love's Diet (Donne)

TO what a cumbersome unwieldiness And burdenous corpulence my love had grown, But that I did, to make it less, And keep it in proportion, Give it a diet, made it feed upon That which love worst endures, discretion

Above one sigh a day I allow'd him not, Of which my fortune, and my faults had part; And if sometimes by stealth he got A she sigh from my mistress' heart, And thought to feast upon that, I let him see 'Twas neither very sound, nor meant to me.

If he wrung from me a tear, I brined it so With scorn and shame, that him it nourish'd not; If he suck'd hers, I let him know 'Twas not a tear which he had got; His drink was counterfeit, as was his meat; For eyes, which roll towards all, weep not, but sweat.

Whatever he would dictate I writ that, But burnt her letters when she writ to me; And if that favour made him fat, I said, "If any title be Convey'd by this, ah! what doth it avail, To be the fortieth name in an entail?"

Thus I reclaim'd my buzzard love, to fly At what, and when, and how, and where I choose. Now negligent of sports I lie, And now, as other falconers use, I spring a mistress, swear, write, sigh, and weep; And the game kill'd, or lost, go talk or sleep.