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To his Coy Mistress
Andrew Marvell
Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, Lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk and pass our long love's day.
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find: I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood,
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow;
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast;
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart;
For, Lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate.
But at my
back I always hear
Time's wingèd chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song: then worms shall try
That long preserved virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust:
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none, I think, do there embrace.
Now
therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may,
And now, like amorous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour
Than languish in his slow-chapt power.
Let us roll all our strength and all
Our sweetness up into one ball,
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life:
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.
Analysis Paper of
To his Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvell
‘To his Coy Mistress’ by Andrew Marvell is
a poem dedicated to the speaker’s ‘sweetheart’,
urging her to make love with him. The speaker of this poem is directly talking
to this mistress, who is being so shy, probably because she is not allowed to
have a relationship with the guy. Also, this poem is in the form of iambic
tetrameter, with rhyming words at the end of each line. All the paired rhyming
words are closely related to each other in meaning, particularly in consistency
with the theme of this poem.
In
the first part of the poem, Ganges’ side
and the tide of Humber are compared,
with the rhyming words side and tide. The Ganges, a river in India and
the Humber, a river in England are far away from each other, thereby
representing the distance between the speaker and his love, the mistress. In
addition, it is easily implied that the girl is refusing to have a
relationship with the man because she is a Jewish, which is also related
to two rhyming words, refuse and Jews. Overall, the first part discusses
the slow and steady love game between him and his
love.
In the
second part, the speaker is suddenly aware of the limitation of time, which is
even more emphasized by rhymes at the end of each line. Here, the pace of the
poem starts to get faster, with much more passion and burning love. Especially
in the lines ‘hear the / Time's winged
chariot hurrying near’, the two rhyming words hear and near give
readers the feeling of being pursued.
The
third part bit by bit begins to explicitly talk about sex, now every line
representing something regarding it, which varies greatly according to the
reader’s interpretation. Also, the line that says, ‘And tear our pleasures with rough strife / Through the iron gates of
life’ indicates the passionate love towards his ‘sweetheart’, for strife
and life together hint the idea of
eternity. This is due to the fact that life can be considered a ‘complete life’
only when it accompanies strife, or conflict. Therefore, this means that the
speaker will always be together with her, no matter how difficult the
approaching problems are. Moreover, the last two lines, ‘Thus, though we cannot make our sun / Stand still, yet we will make him
run.’can signify an important point. Other love poets would probably sing
that he would stop the time even just for an instant, to get together with his
lover. However, the speaker of this poem in turn says he would make the
sun, or time, run, instead of making it stand still. This implies that he would
rather spend the rest of his life together with his love, not for just a while.
As
stated above, the feelings expand and intensify as the poem progresses towards
the end, and this trait is emphasized by two important symbols, the vegetable love in the first part, and instant fires in the last part. In this
context, vegetable love would mean a
love that has the property of life and growth, as does a plant. It can mean a
love that actually grows, takes nourishment and reproduces, although very slowly.
On the other hand, the instant fires
would indicate a love that blazes with passion and desire. These two concepts are
completely opposite to each other, letting the readers recognize the vast
expansion of feelings throughout the poem. I personally love this poem, as its
language is very intense and effective enough to deliver his message of love, which
makes the readers really pay attention to what the speaker is trying to tell.
