Love is many a splendid thing… for some. Really it is only splendid through some eyes, while others see it as just the opposite. Perhaps one can never really know until they have truly loved? While it seems there is no clear answer, poets Minty and Donne have two very contradicting views on this crazy little thing called love. Both use diction, imagery, and figurative language to describe their own encounters and feelings towards love.
In John Donne’s “Valediction: Forbidding Mourning”, the reader can expect to find the classic stance on romance; a Romeo and Juliet-esque type of reaction. A deep connection between the two lovers is obvious, “our two souls therefore, which are one, though I must go, endure not yet a breach, but an expansion…”. Donne explains that their two souls are really one soul; that they are so connected that they make one person. However, even though they are one person, it does not kill them to be apart because they are so strongly one person. When there is distance between them, it does not rip them apart, the distance is only “an expansion” of their singular being. Minty writes about similar circumstances, but with an entirely different outlook on being apart, “do you feel the skin that binds us together as we move, heavy in the house? To sever the muscle could free one, but might kill the other”. Minty similarly describes her love as something shared between two people that are connected. However, this connection is different than that of Donne’s. If Minty were to separate the two lovers, the skin and muscle would have to be ripped apart. This imagery is painful and would be hard to watch. The break-up, if you will, would also be hard to watch. One cannot live without the other, but the other can live without the one. Very contradictory in comparison to Donne’s expansion of a single being; instead Minty describes a situation where being apart could possibly end one of the two lovers. A physical separation, in reality, could lead to injury, the same is true for the two lovers in “Conjoined”.
This notion of physical-ness, if you will, is a trend that is mentioned quite a bit in both poems. In “Valediction” the love described goes beyond that of a physical love, “dull sublunary lovers’ love (whose soul is sense) cannot admit absence, because doth remove those things which elemented it”. Donne is stating that this love is far beyond the love that is found between others, the “dull sublunary lovers”. Sublunary referring to earth, so in comparison, the love mentioned is one of celestial status. It is not like anything physical on earth; it is not tangible or able to be touched. Instead, they are two souls creating one soul that reaches above the expansion of this earth. So in a sense, it will live on after death, and it will live on even if they are apart. It is more of a spiritual love rather than a physical one and so logically nothing can physically interfere with it. In “Conjoined” however, the relationship remains much more sub-lunar to say the least, “like the freaks, Chang and Eng, twins joined at the chest by skin and muscle, doomed to live, even make love, together for sixty years”. This tiny portion of the poem is loaded with physical references, very much the opposite in tone and imagery than Donne’s everlasting love. Once again, the mention of skin and muscle comes up in this poem. It is clearly physical and the repetition of it gives the feeling that this relationship does not reach beyond the physical realm. The words “doomed” and “freaks” are more foreboding and helpless terms to describe what is suppose to be a loving relationship. It is almost ironic that Donne’s indestructible and celestial poem describes how his love contrasts the kind of relationship revealed in Minty’s poem. It seems obvious that the two kinds of love are very similar, yet at the same time do not even compare.
Love can be found everywhere, and with all the hype about it, one would think that they would know what it is all about. In reality though, it seems that love can be different for every person. This is clearly revealed when comparing the tones, images, and diction used to describe two settings of love in Donne’s splendid “Valediction” and Minty’s not so splendid “Conjoined”.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
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