Holy Sonnets

by John Donne

The nineteen poems that comprise John Donne's Holy Sonnets are works of anxiety and spiritual crisis. Most of the sonnets are thought to have been written between 1609 and 1611 but were not published until two decades later—two years after Donne's death. The Holy Sonnets explore the poet's fear and trembling when faced with the realisation of his mortality and self-described unworthiness as a recipient of God's grace and mercy. Donne's poems navigate through his doubts in search of a divine comf...