Analysis on valedition: forbidding mourning - Essay Example

Daniel L. Hishaw of Analysis of “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning” 25 July 2006 John Donne’s “A Valediction: Forbidden Mourning” isa poem about a man explaining to his wife the state of their love and how it will be as he prepares for a journey. The title illustrates a farewell forbidding an unhappy and mournful state before a departure. In this poem, the author compares death to a journey, because the absence is only temporary: “As virtuous men pass mildly away / and whisper to their souls to go.

/ Twere profanation of our joys / to tell the laity of our love” (1-8). The saying “Absence makes the heart grow fonder” parallels Donne’s words closely. The use of the word mourning suggests that the act of leaving could cause similar actions that accompany death and grief. Perhaps the speaker does not want to see his wife mourning his leave of absence, because it will make his departure harder for both of them: “No tear-floods or sigh-tempest move” (6). The mere sight of his wife’s tears and the heartbreaking sound of her sigh could hinder his departure.

Donne speaks of how earthquakes are very destructive, but their time apart will be a constructive activity that will inevitably strengthen their relationship. In addition to earthquakes, this poem also compares their feelings to the movement of the planets that is highly expected to take place: “But trepidation of spheres / though greater for, is innocent” (11-12). The author speaks of the strengthening of the couple’s love by comparing it to someone hammering out gold. Their love may be stretched thin but it remains connected: “Not a breach, but an expansion / Like gold to airy thinness beat” (22-24).

Near the end of the poem, Donne indicates that the couple’s love resembles a mathematical compass: “as stiff twin compasses are two / Thy soul the fixed foot, makes no show / to move, but doth, of th’ other do” (26-28). The compass always makes a perfect circle. The circle, a universal sign for perfection denotes that as the man’s journey comes to an end, he will always return to his wife: “Thy firmness makes my circle just / and makes me end, where I begun” (35-36).The theme that this poem revolves upon explores love through the ideas of assurance and separation.

It uses vivid imagery to impart the moral themes to the readers. An honest, more refined love that springs from a connection of the psyche, as well as the interlocking of two souls into one. Physical presence is irrelevant if a true marriage of the minds has occurred, joining a pair of lovers’ souls eternally. In order to describe the form which Donne gives to true love he chooses to create a scene of separation. The author insists that when in love, absence is not a cause for despair. It is in this that the lovers are able to find the assurance which, gives them strength and prevents the sorrows of separation, because he insists that when two souls are one, they “endure not yet a breach, but an expansion.

” The love and assurance which accompanies such a union of souls is something carried regardless of distance and time. The power of these two forces is such that it is useless to cry and weep, because if true it they are stronger than any divide could be. Donne seems to suggest that the experience in separating for those who are of a “refined love” is a positive one. Although we commonly associate separation with sorrow and despair, he seems to associate it with strength and greatness. In this separation their love is expanded, it grows and travels around the globe with them.

He implies this experience of separation through his metaphor of “gold to airy thinness beat.” In the experience of separation their love is worked and expanded. The compass metaphor seems to suggest also that the two lovers gather their strength from one another, as the one foot stays planted ensuring which “makes my circle just.” In feeding strength to and from each other, their separation simply allows them to express and experience their love in a new and equally positive way, knowing that eventually they will end up where they began.

The imagery reference of this poem depicts of circle in the marriage ring, path of planets, the alchemical symbol of gold being in the center and the depicted planetary path. Work CitedDonne, J. (1896). A Valediction: Forbidding . London : Lawrence and Bullen. Vol. 1 .