John Donne, a seventeenth-century English poet, was born in London in 1572 and known for his ingenuous style of writing (Bloom 10). According to Christopher Moore, an English writer, Donne’ poetry is colloquial in diction and has the flexibility and liveliness of spoken language which imparts an energy and force perfectly capturing his mercurial jumps in thought and description; his poetry is filled with unusual images and metaphor for the fact most of it deals with love and relations between the sexes (Moore 12). Besides “The Flea,” “The Good Morrow,” and others, “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning” is another famous masterpiece for which John Donne is recognized. Izaak Walton, a contemporary of John Donne, stated that “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning” was addressed to Donne’s wife, Anne More, on the occasion of his leaving for a continental trip in 1611 (Bloom 63). Donne’s poem is a good example that shows his metaphysical wit, a term was conferred on him along with his followers, George Herbert, Richard Crashaw, and others by Samuel Johnson, a critic and essayist in the eighteenth-century (Bloom12). To sum up, Donne’s “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning” (Apr 84) is such a love and farewell speech among which he uses a series of simile, symbolism, and analogy to express his feelings and comfort his wife while he is abroad.
Donne, in the first two stanzas, uses the image of virtuous men’s death as a metaphor to his separation from his wife to tell her their love is so great to be affected by their physical separation. The poem, “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,” opens with the image of “As virtuous men pass mildly away, / And whisper to their souls to go, / While some of their sad friends do say, / The breath goes now, and some say, no;” (1-4). The expression “As” Donne uses in the beginning of the first stanza, illustrates that the poem is not about virtuous men who pass away, yet it is a simile Donne creates in order to express his voice, feelings, and point of view about his separation from his wife. In the second stanza, “So let us melt, and make no noise, / No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move ; / 'Twere profanation of our joys / To tell the laity our love” (5-8), Donne urges his wife to stay calm and separate without noise, crying, or sorrow, just like virtuous men who die quietly with no fear while their friends argue over whether the man has died or not; he also uses spiritual language such as profane and laity to convince his wife that mourning about their separation would profane their love and joys, and they as spiritual leader should teach the laity when it comes to spiritual love. To conclude, Donne, in the first two stanzas, creates a metaphor through which he compares the image of virtuous men’s death to his separation from his wife in order to comfort and tell her their love is so strong to be affected by their physical separation.
In addition to the image of virtuous men’s death, Donne uses earthquake, sphere, and gold as symbols to describe his spiritual and unique love for his wife. Donne, in the third stanza, likens the spiritual love between him and his wife to the “trepidation of the spheres,” which is natural and harmless as opposed to “[the] Moving of th' earth,” which hurts and frightens people making them wonder at its causes. Moreover, he, in the fourth and fifth stanza, contrasts “Dull sublunary lovers' love,” whose love is earthy, physical, and sensual, and can easily be threatened by physical separation to the spiritual love between him and his wife, which is “a love so much refined” and can stand physical absence, “ Care less, eyes, lips and hands to miss.” Donne, in the sixth stanza, also states that even though he must go on his journey, “our two souls . . . are one,” and expands his voice by creating another simile through which he compared his love to beaten gold. The fact that their souls are one, Donne believes their separation would not be “A breach, but an expansion, / Like gold to airy thinness beat” (23-24). He uses beaten gold, which is a perfect match and symbol for love, to tell his wife that the hammer, by which gold is beaten, is their separation, and for their souls are one, their separation is not going to breach their love but expand and stretch it as beaten gold does.
Besides the image of virtuous men’s death and the symbolic elements mentioned above, Donne also develops an analogy of compasses as another metaphor in the seventh through the ninth stanza in order to assure his wife of his return. Beyond considering their souls as one in the sixth stanza, Donne provides, in the seventh stanza, another alternative for his wife when he says, “If they be two, they are two so / As stiff twin compasses are two;”(25-26). He argues that even if their souls are two, they are like the two legs of a compass which they cannot be separated at the top even though their bottom (their bodies) can move far apart. He regards his wife’s soul as “the fixed foot, [that] makes no show” yet “if th' other do.” Donne continues his metaphor in the eighth stanza as he says, “And though it in the centre sit, / yet, when the other far doth roam, / It leans, and hearkens after it, / And grows erect, as that comes home” (29-32). Donne wants to tell his wife that she is the fixed foot, which remains in the same place, the center, while he, the other foot, travels around. Even though she remains fixed in the same place, she leans and hearkens after him following his news and path, which consequently makes him complete his journey and return home. Donne finishes his compass imagery in the ninth stanza, where he conclude that the firmness of the connection between his soul and his wife’s, shown in the compass imagery, “. . . makes [his] circle just, / And makes [him] end where [he] begun” (35-36).
Donne’s “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,” is one of his well-known masterpieces for it has a great selection of literary elements such as simile, symbolism, and analogy. According to Coleridge, “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,” is an admirable poem, which none but Donne could have written (Donne 97). He uses his metaphysical wit to develop several images such as death, two legs of twin compasses, and scientific phenomenon in order to comfort his wife and assure her of his return. To sum up, Donne’s poem, “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,” is such a unique poem in which he delivers a strong message about his spiritual love for his wife on the eve of his journey.