Dulnesse
A Lament and a Plea
The speaker laments his spiritual dullness and begs God for life so he can praise joyfully.
Why do I languish like this, drooping and dull, as if I were nothing but earth?1 Oh, give me life, that I may praise you with joy, full to the brim!2
The Worldly Lover's Art
The speaker contrasts his own dullness with the elaborate praise a worldly lover can offer his beloved.
The wanton lover can praise his fairest love in an elaborate song, and with clever metaphors curl her curled hair over again.3
Christ, My Only Beauty
The speaker affirms that Christ alone is his loveliness, life, and light, and that even the dust of Christ's path becomes beautiful.
You are my loveliness, my life, my light, beauty alone to me: your bloody and undeserved death makes you pure red and white.✦✦ When all the perfections appear as one—those that your form reveals—the very dust you walk on gives rise to beauties here.
Where Is My Song?
The speaker questions where his own poetic expressions of devotion have gone, noting that even worldly lovers find inspiration in their troubles.
Where are my lines, then? My approaches?4 Views?5 Where are my window-songs?6 Lovers are still pretending, and even wrongs sharpen their Muse.7
Lost in Flesh, Looking to You
The speaker confesses being lost in the flesh and prays for God to clear his gift so he may steadfastly look to God, acknowledging that no creature is fit to love God.
But I'm lost in the flesh, whose sugared lies still mock me and grow bold: surely you put a mind there, if I could find where it lies.8 Lord, make your gift clear, so that with a steady mind I may look only toward you—only look, for who can be fit to love you? What angel is?9
Read the original English
WHy do I languish thus, drooping and dull, As if I were all earth? O give me quicknesse, that I may with mirth Praise thee brim-full!
The wanton lover in a curious strain Can praise his fairest fair; And with quaint metaphors her curled hair Curl o're again.
Thou art my lovelinesse, my life, my light, Beautie alone to me: Thy bloudy death and undeserv'd, makes thee Pure red and white.
When all perfections as but one appeare, That those thy form doth show, The very dust, where thou dost tread and go, Makes beauties here.
Where are my lines then? my approaches? views? Where are my window-songs? Lovers are still pretending, & ev'n wrongs Sharpen their Muse.
But I am lost in flesh, whose sugred lyes Still mock me, and grow bold: Sure thou didst put a minde there, if I could Finde where it lies.
Lord, cleare thy gift, that with a constant wit I may but look towards thee: Look onely; for to love thee, who can be, What angel fit?
Scripture echoes
Notes
- 1 ↩Herbert's "all earth" means wholly earthly matter—heavy, lifeless clay—without spiritual life or fire.
- 2 ↩"quicknesse" is early-modern aliveness/vitality (as in the quick vs. the dead), not mere speed; rendered as "life" for that sense of being made spiritually alive.
- 3 ↩Early modern 'curious' means artful/elaborate, not inquisitive; 'strain' is a song or melodic/poetic mode. 'Quaint' means ingenious/clever, not old-fashioned. 'Curl o're again' keeps Herbert's conceit: the lover re-embellishes already-curled hair by figurative redescription.
- 4 ↩Early modern 'approaches' here means poetic overtures or advances toward the beloved (God), not mere physical nearness.
- 5 ↩Elliptical continuation of the prior question; 'views' likely means poetic prospects, sights, or contemplative takes, not mere opinions.
- 6 ↩'Window-songs' are serenade-like love songs sung at a window; kept as a compound to preserve Herbert's courtship image applied to devotion.
- 7 ↩'Pretending' keeps the early modern sense of pressing claims or making amorous pretenses (not only feigning); 'Muse' is retained as the conventional figure for poetic inspiration.
- 8 ↩Early modern 'sugred lyes' means sweetened, flattering falsehoods—the flesh's pleasant deceptions, not mere untruths in the abstract.
- 9 ↩Early modern 'wit' is the mind/understanding, not cleverness; rendered as 'mind'. 'Cleare thy gift' asks God to purify or free the speaker's given faculty from dullness so even a simple looking toward God becomes possible.
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