Metaphysical Conceit in John Donne's The Sun Rising Essay

The feeling of love is magical; the world is painted with pastel singing birds and blooming flowers, and the heart is full and warm as the lover inadvertently falls deeper into the realm of affection for a person he sees through a pair of blinders. While love can bring the emotions of joy, tenderness, and a sense of wholeness in one’s heart, the soul-crushing, heart-wrenching discovery that the lover does not share mutual feelings drastically shifts the perfect world of a person in love into a chaotic world of anguish. Feelings of anger, bitterness, and longing consumes the lover and leaves him in a frenzy of mixed emotions. In John Donne’s “Love’s Deity”, the complex feelings associated with unrequited love is displayed through the use of

The speaker in Andrew Marvell's 'To His Coy Mistress'; is a man who is addressing a silent listener, who happens to be his mistress. In this dramatic monologue the speaker tries to explain his feelings to his mistress. The speaker uses many allusions to empires and other objects, events and ideas that are not directly related to his feelings, in order to explain how he feels. He uses these allusions to exaggerate his feelings in order to clearly show them. After reading over the poem once, you get a sense of what the speaker is feeling. Upon further analysis of the poem you realize that the allusions used in the poem, are in fact, what makes this poem so interesting.

Beginning early in the poem and used heavily throughout, imagery and personification are utilized to exemplify the lovers' argument. The belief that love is never ending is created through never ending connotations, "I'll love you, dear, I'll love you Till China and Africa meet, and the river jumps over the mountain and the salmon sing in the street." The lover uses images of the impossible such as fish singing, the laws of physics breaking, and distant continents meeting. This strengthens the original belief that love is eternal and superior to time itself. These tasks are nearly impossible and the idea of love one day ending is equated with them.

Meditation 17 is a poem by John Donne that reveals his thoughts and beliefs on the world altogether. We see a lot of religion cited in this poem and then we also see a kind of dark side of that which would be death. In this poem, John Donne elevates this poem by the way he structures it as well as the language and situation.

He uses the power of her character to suggest that regardless of the patriarchal structure of society, women still have some level of power over

Through the violent act of raping him (14) as well as battering his heart (1) he wants God to temporarily break his divine nature and embody the sinful nature that Donne couldn’t escape; absolving Donne in the aggressive way he felt he deserved. Donne exclaims his frustration and he puzzles at life and his relationship with God in a philosophical way, asking more questions than answering. The sonnet opens with these lines that accentuate the forceful language that Donne

He highlights this through a shift in tone and object of focus, now questioning himself and establishing a tone humility and humbleness. The line “But who am I, that dare dispute with Thee?” ( 9) encapsulates this moment of recognition and plays a parallel role to that a soliloquy takes in drama or theatre. When compared to his superior tone earlier in the sonnet he belittles himself as he recognizes his own audacity to question the motivations of God. Donne’s anagnorisis reveals the one path to salvation through God's mercy and the blood of Jesus alone.

Death is a word that comes with several different connotations. For some, it feels grim, like the termination of everything that they have ever been or have accomplished. To others, it may sound peaceful, like an escape. In this way, death can be feared, but it can also be eagerly anticipated. Much of what contributes to one’s view of death, is his or her religious affiliation. For example, an atheist’s uncertainty of an afterlife correlates as logically as a Christian’s certainty of heaven and hell. However, John Donne was not distinctly on one side of this spectrum. Donne tottered in the middle, torn between his fear of death and God’s promise of salvation.

The meaning of all this is that love us a very complex element in humans and even to society that it really makes a big impact on humans. This theme is very sense worthy. This changes the way you could look at some one and feel about that person. This type of theme could make it feel as if you almost have a sixth sense in you by how complex this type of theme in life could be.

The implications of the first few lines of the poem emit the notion that the poems text and word choice show the dilemma Donne felt on Good Friday,1613. He is stuck traveling, when in fact he should be praying and honoring the death and sacrifice of Christ. By implementing that feeling into the subject of the poem, Donne is able to exaggerate the struggle the subject is having about his deviation from God, which cripples him. Furthermore, at the time Donne wrote this poem, it is clear he was engulfed in the thought of his own sin and struggled to face God. Therefore, the subject in the poem acts as a martyr for which Donne can confess and repent by submerging the subject in a state of sin.

This sonnet starts off with a rhetorical question to create a slightly meditative tone that Donne utilizes to remind his soul of what God, who is the king of the universe, does and has done for

In the second stanza, Donne goes on to make the point that the flea is

“The relationship between the energies of the inquiring mind that an intelligent reader brings to the poem and the poem’s refusal to yield a single comprehensive interpretation enacts vividly the everlasting intercourse between the human mind, with its instinct to organise and harmonise, and the baffling powers of the universe about it.”

Near the end of the poem, Donne makes an unlikely comparison between the couple and a draftsman's compass. This is one of his most famous metaphysical conceits because the two elements which are being compared appear completely different, and yet, amazingly, Donne is able to connect them. He explains that his wife is his "fixed foot" that leans towards him as he roams and straightens again as he returns, but remains his center. Her firmness is what makes his circle complete, "[a]nd makes [him] end where [he] begun"(line 36). The imagery of the circle and the spheres in this poem solidify the eternity of their love and the knowledge that the speaker will always return to the place where he began. Donne's comparisons create an image of celebration rather than mourning.

The central theme, introduced quite early within the poem, is the helplessness of death. Throughout the poem the speaker belittles death and approaches it with such bravery and poise. Donne confronts death by saying it is not in any regard “mighty and dreadful” (2), but rather brings “much pleasure” (7). Death is personified in the poem, and in this regard, possess no greater power over man. The speaker of the poem is Donne himself. He uses his literary tools of rhetoric and poetic devices to belittle death. Throughout the poem, the speaker comes across as being slightly arrogant, but he refuses to show weakness. His arrogance shows that he is not afraid of death as he demands death not to be proud. Donne takes the association of death and sleep, and reinvents this comparison to a greater effect. He describes sleep as being “pictures” (5) of death and death is no more different or more frightening. He extends this metaphor throughout the poem. In the second last line of the poem he