The Good Morrow’

Verse 1: I wonder, truly, what you and I did before we loved one another. Were we not yet
weaned, or sucked like babes at the teat on naïve pleasures? Or did we lie there asleep as in the
story, in the Golden Legend, of the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus, young Christians who fell asleep,
were sealed in a cave, and woke a hundred and more years later only when the cave was again
opened? So it has been, but our love now comprises every image of pleasure that can be
invented or imagined, because if I ever desired and possessed beauty previously it was merely
an image of you.

Verse 2: Now good-morning to our souls that have awoken from their sleep, and which do not
keep a watch on each other, out of fear of our allowing our love to stray elsewhere, since love
curbs the love of other sights, and makes out of one little room the whole world. Let explorers
have voyaged to new worlds (the New World, the Americas) or let maps of other worlds (stars
and planets) have shown many worlds, worlds on worlds (hosts of stars, and moons orbiting
planets), let us possess one world, where each possesses a world in the other or both, and is a
world in themselves or both.

Verse 3: My face is reflected in your eye, your face in mine, and our true hearts are plainly
evident in our heart-shaped faces. Where can we find two better hemispheres than our
respective eyes, which are devoid of the coldness of the northern hemisphere or the declining
sunset of the western one? Whatever dies does so as a result of an imbalance of the mixture of
humours in the body (as Galen described). If our two loves make one, or we love so equally that
nothing can fall into imbalance, then nothing of it can die.

‘The Good Morrow’ by John Donne-a Flawless Metaphysical Poem

‘The Good Morrow’ is a typical Donnian love poem, divided into three stanzas. It’s one of those
love poems in which he praises the spiritual relationship between men and women and hails it so
ardently.

In the opening stanza, the poet expresses his wonder as to what he and his beloved did before
they fell in love with each other. He becomes surprised remembering their past love experiences.
He compares the love experiences of himself and his beloved with `weaning’, falsely sucking
country pleasures’ and `snorting.’ The reference to these three physical activities indicates that
they spent a life of worldly enjoyment. But now the poet using the conjunction ‘But’ makes a
contrast and say’s that all these past physical activities seem to be utterly meaningless. The
closing two lines of the first stanza imply that though the poet indulged himself in ‘country
pleasures’, he has never been unmindful to perfect beauty of ideal spiritual love, which he always
desired and has finally ‘got’ in his present beloved.

Obviously there is a shift from physical to spiritual love, sleeping to waking period, sensuous
appearances to ideal reality and as if from platonic cave to the world of light in the poet and his
beloved. Here the poet seems to have touched the metaphysics of Plato. In his metaphysics,
Plato at first takes something concrete such as man, but soon he leaps into abstract namely the
Form of man. Similarly Donne also begins with physical love and soon he turns to Platonic or
metaphysical love.

The first stanza contains several Donnian elements. It opens abruptly with an explosive question.
This abrupt colloquial beginning, which is so characteristic of Donne startles us and captures our
attention. Another noticeable thing is that Donne swears his true relation – ‘I wonder by my troth’.
Here he is unconventional. Any of his contemporary of Elizabethan poets might swear to God, but
Donne has not done it. Then there are the references of physical union and the use of imageries
in the following three lines. The fourth line contains a legendary conceit,a legend that tells of
seven young men of Ephesus who took refuge in a cave during the persecution of Diocletian and
were entombed there. They were found alive two centuries later. Here Donne compares himself
and his beloved with the seven sleepers. Here he is cynical when he utters the word ‘did’. Surely
the word ‘did’ includes the connotations of sexual doing – what did we ever do with the time?

The second stanza begins with hail and celebration. The unconscious past of flesh is over and a
new conscious spiritual relationship begins. So the speaker cerebrates the present. “Now good
morrow to our waking souls”. He also makes declaration that their souls have also learnt not to
spy one another. That the married women or men involve in extra-marital affair was a dominant
theme in the Elizabethan and Jacobean literature. So, fear only works in sensual lovers as
motivation for watching over each other, least the other should become unfaithful to his or her
mate. But the speaker and his beloved have overcome this fear and a peaceful satisfaction
prevails their love. And for their faithful love they will control the temptations of other things. They
love so faithfully and ardently that their love has the force to be merged into the universal love
and to move out to become “an every where”.

As spiritual lovers, the poet and his beloved are indifferent to earthly pleasures and possessions
– let the sea-lovers and map-lovers do what they like to do. The lovers want to be happy with
their joint world though they have their individual worlds but their individual worlds are fused into a
single world. Now they are the joint owners of a single world.

Here in this stanza, we find the presence of imagery from the contemporary geographical world.
That is to say the contemporary geographical interest of the explorers.

The third stanza opens with endearing words from the speaker. The two lovers stand so closely
that their respective faces are reflected in each others eyes. The simplicity of their heart is also
reflected in their faces, which are conceived as two hemispheres of their world. But their world of
love is so unearthly that its hemispheres are free from coldness and decay. They are not afraid of
separation or break up of their “relation, because” ‘what ever dyes, was not mixt equality’. The
ingredients of their love have been proportionately mixed and there is no ware and woof between
them. They have love equally and proportionately.

Thus the poem ends with the establishment of true friendship. After an abrupt beginning, there is
calmness at last. The couple has rejected the country pleasures and entered into a true inter-
dependent friendship. They have renounced the mundane world in order possess an unearthly
world. Experience has thought them that the true happiness can be achieved through a mutual
spiritual friendship.

In the first stanza, there is the regret for past doings, in the second stanza the pleasure of
discovering something in the last stanza, the prospect/hope of doing better/using the discovery.
The abrupt beginning of the poem, the use of conceits form everyday life and myth in the first
stanza, the geographical reference of stanza two, the use of scholastic philosophy in stanza
three, and ultimately the emphasis of spiritual love continue to make it one of those poems of
Donne which combine intellect and emotion. These above motioned qualities have made the
poem get a certain place in honored, treasured lyrics written by John Donne.

The Good Morrow is one of John Donne’s earlier love poetries. The purpose of his love poetries
are to focus on how important he sees his love and to show the superiority of his love upon
others. The Good Morrow is different from other love poetries by Donne through that it brings in
the past to show love. In this poem, the poet uses literary or poetic devices such as iambic
pentameter and hexameter, enjambment, consistent rhyming scheme, paraphrasing and
metaphors.

The Good Morrow seems to be set just after Donne and his lover has woken up in bed. This is
evident by his reference to dream in line 6, waking up in line 7 and the closeness of the lovers as
seen by the eyes in line 15. It seems that as soon as the lovers awake, the poem begins, and
Donne rhetorically questions “I wonder by my troth, what thou and I did till we loved? Were we not
wean’d till then?” This is rhetorical question brings an imperative opening with it as is the case in
many other of his poems. Continuing in the first stanza, Donne tells of his desire to be with his
loved one by stating that if any beauty it was that he saw in his dream, it would be her. Similar to
his other love poetries such as The Sun Rising, he directly addresses his love for a woman. In the
next stanza, he implies that no matter where, he and his love will form a little room everywhere
and the room would be the entire world.

Donne uses paraphrase in the second stanza to draw a few key points into the poem. He and his
lover will be the world and let sea discoverers to discover new worlds, and then each of the lovers
will possess a world but both worlds will be one. A kind of paradox but it indicates that individuality
will not separate the lovers.

In the third stanza, Donne describes physically that he and his lover are looking into each other’s
eyes and able to see each self within each other’s eyes. This is suggesting the closeness
between the lovers both physically, being in bed, and mentally, being in love. With the world that
the lovers create, Donne suggests that there are no cold places such as the North Pole and
declining civilised places such as cities in the west. During the time of Donne, colonisation and
imperialism were starting, especially in England, hence ‘declining west’ Their love thus seems
natural and with warmth. The two worlds combined as one that the lovers create are metaphors
for their eyes, as they are looking into each other. To them, the most important world is the world
created by these two eyes, whilst the outside world is of no concerns to them. The poem is
concluded by Donne suggesting that their love is eternal since their two loves are mixed so
perfectly that it will not deteriorate.

Enjambment is evident throughout the poem as seen in line 1 and the second last line of the
poem. The position of each is at the extreme ends of the poem, hence structured in such a way
that it suggests a cycle that from the last line the love will continue back to the first line like it has
not changed at all. The rhyming scheme also suggests structure and thus the persistence of their
love, their love so strong that it will not decline.

The poem starts with the description of their love and ends with their love achieving immortality.

The poem Good Morrow is an aubade a morning song sung by the lover after the night of
lovemaking. Basically the poem is about love, it is seen as an intense absolute experience, which
isolates the lovers from the reality. It contains three stanzas with seven lines in each and follows
a rhyme scheme of ABABCC. All three stanzas represent three stages of love. The first stanza
deals with the past experience of love. A dramatic opening can be seen in the first stanza with a
rhetorical question. It shows the poet’s amazement and surprise at his new discovery of love. And
at the same time it implies his scornfulness towards his naïve ignorance. He feels that both he
and his beloved were like two little children who “suck’d on country pleasures.” So the process is
metaphorically compared to a child who sucks milk from the mother and a mother who weans it
when the due time comes. Likewise Donne sees it is the due time to stop sucking country
pleasures and that’s why they should wean from it and consummate their love. It brings the fact
that before consummation their love was immature and childish. Moreover the poet brings out a
biblical metaphor to suggest that they were caught in an illusion and were blind to the reality.
‘seven sleepers den’ is a biblical image and it suggests that they were drugged and sleep out of
reality. All pleasures that they enjoyed before consummation of love were mere fancies.

The second stanza brings the serene and peaceful experience that they gained after
consummating their love. It is the celebration of present love and it makes their souls awaken to
the reality. Moreover it makes them faithful to each other and they are savoring the joy of the
previous night still. At the same time the poet reveals the new discoveries at that time with the
symbols of maps and discoveries. Yet for them their union is self- sufficient and the outer world is
rejected. For them Love the whole world is a small room.

The third stanza reveals the future of their love where both the poet and his beloved become
immortal. It is the perfect union and the contentment of the lovers. It is the union of two souls and
mutual understanding between the two lovers. Furthermore the poet justifies it by saying that
each lover sees a half hemisphere in other’s eyes. And with the last argument he brings the fact
that in the world each unequally mixed thing get decay, yet the union in between the poet and his
beloved mixed equally and never decays. So there is no fear in their love. Not only their perfect
love is immortal but also the lovers both he and his beloved become immortal. Finally it brings the
immortality of love and the perfect love as a result of union of two souls.

In brief John Donne in his poem ‘Good Morrow’ celebrates love as a supreme experience in the
world. He rejects the rigid and superficial Elizabethan conventions. He adds realism, sincerity and
passion.

John Donne (1572-1631) is regarded by many critics as the greatest poet of the “metaphysical”
school, who used language in new ways to express emotion and meaning at the same time.
Donne’s poetry falls into two main groups, namely that written before he “got religion” (he ended
his life as Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral) and that written after that event. Among his earlier works
are the “Songs and Sonets”, a set of love poems written over a period of time and which include
“The Good-Morrow”.

“The Good-Morrow” consists of three 7-line stanzas with an ABABCCC rhyme scheme, although
some of the rhymes read as half-rhymes in modern diction.

It is typical of Donne’s poetic method in that it opens with a line (or several) that grabs the
attention and then develops the theme through the poem. It also takes the form, used quite often
by Donne, of posing a direct question either to himself or the subject of the poem. In this case it is
both:

I wonder, by my truth, what thou and I

Did, till we loved; were we not weaned till then,
But sucked on country pleasures, childishly?
Or snorted we in the Seven Sleepers’ den?

(The “Seven Sleepers” refers to a legend of the miraculous survival of seven Christians who fell
asleep in a cave during the reign of the Roman Emperor Decius and were walled up, only to
come to life when the cave was opened nearly 200 years later)

The question is therefore posed and answered: “Twas so”. Donne then develops the “conceit”
that being in love distorts one’s sense of reality to such an extent that what went before was
unreal. This is expressed by his statement that any woman who had taken his fancy in the past
was “but a dream of thee”.

In the second stanza the poem’s title is explained by love having given rise to a “Seven Sleepers”
miracle, and also adding a completely new dimension to the lovers’ perception:

And now good morrow to our waking souls,

Which watch not one another out of fear;
For love, all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room, an everywhere.

Modern readers might see that last line as almost a “Doctor Who’s Tardis” concept, in that what
seems small at the outset can contain a universe once opened. In Donne’s view, the love of two
people for each other can outweigh all other considerations and be as all-encompassing as they
want it to be. The explorations of “sea-discoverers” (at a time when Europeans were still ignorant
of large portions of the world) are irrelevant to the lovers who: “… possess one world, each hath
one, and is one”.

The third stanza introduces a new conceit that further develops the themes of re-awakening and
discovery of new worlds:

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,

And true plain hearts do in the faces rest;
Where can we find two better hemispheres,
Without sharp North, without declining West?

To be awake, eyes must be open, and, as each lover looks fully into the eyes of the other, they
see themselves, and their “true plain hearts” reflected. The eyeballs thus become hemispheres
that, for the lovers, are just as wide-ranging and wonderful as those of Planet Earth. They are
indeed superior to the geographical ones as they lack the coldness of “sharp North” and the
sunset of “declining West”.

Donne then throws in another idea, namely that lasting love must come from equal sharing
between the partners, because “Whatever dies, was not mixed equally”. The concluding couplet
stresses this point:

If our two loves be one; or thou and I

Love so alike that none do slacken, none can die.

Love therefore conquers all, is the only thing that matters, and is a rebirth to immortality. This is
the “pre-religious” John Donne, but the Christian belief of spiritual rebirth is very close to what is
being presented here.

In “The Good-Morrow”, as with some other “Songs and Sonets”, the poet is sincere and
passionate, which suggests that the object of the passion could be Anne More, who became
Donne’s wife.

As a poem, “The Good-Morrow” is an example of something that was quite new to English poetry
by beginning with a conversational and startling opening and projecting the reader into the poem
in a way that holds their attention through a complex development of thought that preserves the
passion rather than letting it cool. This was not always successfully done by the “Metaphysicals”
(Donne included) who often let their delight in conceits and cleverness get in the way of the
emotional content of their poems. “The Good-Morrow” is a good example of a John Donne poem
in terms of its development but it is first and foremost a powerful love poem that never loses sight
of its goal.