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Immensitie cloysterd in thy deare wombe,

Now leaves his welbelov’d imprisonment,

There he hath made himselfe to his intent

Weake enough, now into our world to come;

But Oh, for thee, for him, hath th’Inne no roome?

Yet lay him in this stall, and from the’Orient,

Starres, and wisemen will travell to prevent

Th’effect of Herods jealous generall doome;

Seest thou, my Soule, with thy faiths eyes, how he

Which fils all place, yet none holds him, doth lye?

Was not his pity towards thee wondrous high,

That would have need to be pittied by thee?

Kisse him, and with him into Egypt goe,

With his kinde mother, who partakes thy woe.

John Donne, “Nativitie,” in The Complete Poetry of John Donne, ed. John T. Shawcross (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1967), 335.  “Nativitie” is the third poem in the cycle “La Corona.”

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