A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning

      BY JOHN DONNE

As virtuous men pass mildly away,

   And whisper to their souls to go,

Whilst some of their sad friends do say

   The breath goes now, and some say, No:

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.

Moving of th' earth brings harms and fears,

   Men reckon what it did, and meant;

But trepidation of the spheres,

   Though greater far, is innocent.

Dull sublunary lovers' love

   (Whose soul is sense) cannot admit

Absence, because it doth remove

   Those things which elemented it.

But we by a love so much refined,

   That our selves know not what it is,

Inter-assured of the mind,

   Care less, eyes, lips, and hands to miss.

Our two souls therefore, which are one,

   Though I must go, endure not yet

A breach, but an expansion,

   Like gold to airy thinness beat.

If they be two, they are two so

   As stiff twin compasses are two;

Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no show

   To move, but doth, if the other do.

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.

Such wilt thou be to me, who must,

   Like th' other foot, obliquely run;

Thy firmness makes my circle just,

   And makes me end where I begun.

Summary

"A Valediction: forbidding mourning" was written by Donne for his wife Anne when he left for France along with Robert Drury in November, 1611. This poem has been universally acclaimed for its beauty and strength of imagery. Donne tells Anne that virtuous men do not grumble about their death and allow their souls to depart without much fuss. So Anne should allow him to take leave of her without much grief.

People are terribly afraid of the earthquake and calculate the harms brought about by it. But the movement of the spheres is not noticed by them at all since it is harmless. People whose love is physical cannot endure each other's absence. But their love is refined and they do not care for their physical organs like eyes , lips and hands. Their two souls have been made one by love. Hence they will not suffer any breach. They will expand during the absence just as gold expands when it is beaten to Airy thinners.

The lovers are like the two feet of compass which are united at the top. She is like the fixed foot while the poet is like the moving foot:

                  And though it in the centre sit,

                  Yet when the other far doth Rome,

                  It leanes , and hearkent after it,

                  And groups erect, as that comes home.

The firmness of the fixed foot helps the moving foot to draw a perfect circle. Similarly, the loyalty and affection of the lady will help him to complete his journey successfully. Coleridge describes it as "An admirable poem which none but Donne could have written".