Many of Donne's poems dwell on issues of death and mortality, including one of my favorites of his works, "Death Be Not Proud", which I've been remiss in not posting before. Expediency caused him to convert from Catholicism to the Anglican church Donne was eventually forced by King James I to become an Anglican clergyman (by royal decree, preventing him from occupying any other job, no less). The Metaphysical Poets delighted in using what was considered unusual imagery and syntax in their poems. Samuel Johnson dubbed him a "Metaphysical Poet", part of (and in truth, founder of) a loosely associated group of poets who used art, history and religion as extended metaphor (known as a conceit, a word which here has absolutely nothing to do with being stuck-up. Donne lived in the late 16th and early 17th century, and wrote an interesting mix of work - some religious, some quite, um, not-religious.Ībout two hundred years after his birth, Dr. The Meditation comes from Donne's religious persona. Such a lovely snippet, though the entire Medititation is pretty great. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls it tolls for thee. No man is an island, entire of itself every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. Then I got to thinking about that bell in "Full Fathom Five", which led me to think of this passage from John Donne's Meditation XVII, presented here with modernized spellings: My next thought was to post "I started Early - Took my Dog" by Emily Dickinson but I posted that one last year during National Poetry Month as part of this "Building a Poetry Collection" series. I even spent hours reading and pondering yesterday, but it's a ridiculous notion - I could spend a week on that poem, and more than one post on any one section of it.
KellyrfinemanAfter yesterday's poem, "Full Fathom Five" by William Shakespeare, I seriously considered posting about The Wasteland by T.S.
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