The Good Morrow Commentary

The Good Morrow

John Donne

I wonder, by my troth, 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?

'Twas so; but this, all pleasures fancies be.

If ever any beauty I did see,

Which I desired, and got, 'twas but a dream of thee.

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.

Let sea-discoveres to new worlds have shown,

Let us possess one world, each hath one, and is one.

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?

Whatever dies was not mixed equally,

If our two loves be one, or, thou and I

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

Commentary

John Donne could be seen as a hopeless romantic, defying negative sentiments about his marriage to the love of his life. This love that was shared by the two of them was portrayed in his poem, The Good Morrow, which details in metaphor the type of everlasting love they shared, separating themselves from others by sharing a common loving reality world. The diction chosen by Donne only emphasizes the extent of his passion for his paramour, creating a more personal declaration of his affections.

In the first stanza Donne starts off with detailing his life before meeting his lover, including the action of sucking on country pleasures childishly, which can have the indirect connotation of a former life of promiscuity. The fact that the speaker 'got around' in a sense, serves to be ignored, as the addressee is assured in the final line of the stanza that none of his prior partners could compare with the type of affection and passion the speaker has for their lover.The future incorporation of 'our' and 'us' into the second and third stanzas, contrary to the wandering personal 'I's of the first, emphasize the shared feelings between the two.

The good-morrow of the first line of the second stanza(wow, what a mouthful), is welcomed by the speaker, who appears to wake up next to his lover, with the prospect of setting out on a journey of their love. This journey can only be emphasized by Donne's choice of wording when describing the manner in which they will finally be able to fulfill the potential of their love as a team of travelers that sail towards a place without being veered off track.