The Broken Heart

I'm sharing this from my friend Donna.

by Donna Olayan on Thursday, February 3, 2011 at 3:45am

THE BROKEN HEART.

by John Donne

He is stark mad, whoever says,

    That he hath been in love an hour,

Yet not that love so soon decays,

    But that it can ten in less space devour ;

Who will believe me, if I swear

That I have had the plague a year?

    Who would not laugh at me, if I should say

    I saw a flash of powder burn a day?

Ah, what a trifle is a heart,

    If once into love's hands it come !

All other griefs allow a part

    To other griefs, and ask themselves but some ;

They come to us, but us love draws ;

He swallows us and never chaws ;

    By him, as by chain'd shot, whole ranks do die ;

    He is the tyrant pike, our hearts the fry.

If 'twere not so, what did become

    Of my heart when I first saw thee?

I brought a heart into the room,

    But from the room I carried none with me.

If it had gone to thee, I know

Mine would have taught thine heart to show

    More pity unto me ; but Love, alas !

    At one first blow did shiver it as glass.

Yet nothing can to nothing fall,

    Nor any place be empty quite ;

Therefore I think my breast hath all

    Those pieces still, though they be not unite ;

And now, as broken glasses show

A hundred lesser faces, so

    My rags of heart can like, wish, and adore,

    But after one such love, can love no more.

Source:
Donne, John. Poems of John Donne.vol I.
E. K. Chambers, ed.
London: Lawrence & Bullen, 1896. 50-51.


Another analogy

Analogy for a Broken Heart
by ~FarFallaLoduca

But it is easier to forget than forgive. When there is no soap that leave residue on our hardened and cracked hearts, unused and dead. Scrub it and scrape it and there is still the infection alive and feeding on you.  You let it whisper that it won’t let you down and the orgasm in your head imagines the mistake that everything will be perfect if you don’t look for the trouble; the parasite in your veins.