English or Italian?

"One short sleep passed, we wake eternally, / And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die" ("Death, be not proud," 13-14).

We've gooot another sonnet! This one is apparently both English and Italian, but I feel like it follows the English form more closely with respect to rhyme. Let me try this: abba abba cddc ee -- is that anything close to the rhyming scheme? If so, it ends in a rhyming couplet like the English sonnet. However, there's a shift in the nice abba pattern after eight lines which is deceptively Italian.

What about the thought process of the poem? Blistex addresses death in an apostrophe, personifying death as wrongly "proud" (1). It argues that death has no reason to be proud -- it's not "mighty and dreadful" (2) as some say, and even when people "die," they don't actually die. Headphones points out that death is associated with "rest and sleep" (5), both very peaceful things, and good men are always ready to embrace death. Then, we get to Lanyard, who says that death depends on "fate" and "chance" and is associated with things like "prison" and "war" (9-10).

I feel like there's no real shift in thought between lines eight and nine. The real shift comes between lines twelve and thirteen. The first twelve lines discuss why death should not be proud; then, the last two lines is a concluding defeat of death, as you will.

Therefore, I dub this poem an English sonnet which is also a tiny bit Italian. It's a little confused about its nationality.

In Celebration of My Third Poem by Donne

"What I will say, I will not tell thee now, / Lest that preserve thee" ("The Apparition," 14-15).

In deducing the connotative situation of this poem, I'm zeroing in on lines like "thou thinkst thee free / From all solicitation from me" (2-3) and "in worse arms shall see" (5). The speaker claims that his "murderess," likely a former lover ("my love is spent," line 15), isn't off the hook. She will receive some sort of persistent request from the speaker, and I don't think it's a nice one. The speaker seems to imply that his "murderess" cheated on him -- that's why I think he wants her to "painfully repent" (16). I split that infinitive in service of the quote's cohesion.

So I'm going to analyze my quoted line based on that situation.

What is the speaker going to say to her? It's an empty threat. However, empty threats can be the most powerful ones. When we threaten people like that, they usually assume the worst. I don't think the speaker actually has a plan as to what he's going to say to his "murderess," or even if he's going to say anything to her at all, but if he does, I know it can't be good. The tone throughout the poem is very judgmental of the woman in question, and this quote extends the tone to threatening, as well.

"Why, Professor Dumbledore, you look absolutely ravishing!"

"Take me to you, imprison me, for I, / Except you enthrall me, never shall be free, / Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me" ("Batter my heart, three-personed God," 12-14).

In this poem, the speaker is addressing God, asking Him to "batter" him so that he can "rise and stand" (1-3). That paradox is nice and everything, but I'm going to focus on the last three lines, which contain two paradoxes. Both paradoxes are resolved by the double meanings of certain words (like "batter" in this first example). Okay, the last two paradoxes . . .

The speaker asks God to "imprison" him, for unless God "enthralls" him, he cannot be "free." At first glance, that makes no sense because one who is imprisoned is not free. However, the word "enthrall" can mean to captivate in a charming way or in a slavery-y way. The speaker is suggesting that it would be oh-so-charming if God were to enslave him; that would make him free of evil.

Then, the speaker asks God to "ravish" him, for unless God ravishes him, he cannot be chaste. If we just use one definition of "ravish" -- to rape -- this statement seems contradictory. Rape is not chaste. However, "ravish" can also mean to fill with joy, which is more of what the speaker is requesting.

My argument here is that the speaker wants to be figuratively imprisoned and raped, and he literally wants to be charmed and filled with joy. Iiii sincerely hope it's not the other way around.

Dying and Journeying are Very Different Things

"And though it in the center sit, / Yet when the other far doth roam, / It leans, and hearkens after it, / And grows erect, as that comes home" ("A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning," 29-32).

Donne's poem presents images of both death and journeying. It seems to me like the speaker is using figurative images of death to compare them to his journey in which he will depart from his love -- in other words, I don't think he's going to die soon.

The initial stanza is a simile -- "as virtuous men pass mildly away" (1) -- to introduce a figurative image of death. The title also presents a picture of mourning, public grief over someone's death. However, details in the poem suggest to me that the speaker is not pondering his impending death.

The "priests," or the true lovers in the poem, engage in "refined" love that is "inter-assured of the mind" (17-20), and when they depart, their souls behave in a special way. Their souls endure an "expansion," hearkening after each other, and even if they are two different souls, they are like "compasses" because they spin in the same direction (25-28). Then, there are implications of those lovers reuniting -- "as that comes home" (32) and "makes me end where I begun" (36).

I suppose they could be reuniting in the afterlife, but the images of a journey -- the compass and the longing for company -- seem to be predominant.