Selected Poems by John Donne

‘Let maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown;’ – Only explorers saw the actual new lands, but many more could look at the maps being drawn of these places in Donne’s time.

‘Let us possess one world; each hath one, and is one.’ – ‘hath one’ implies that each possesses the world of the other; ‘is one’ means that each is a whole world to the other.

‘My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,’ – This is the common image (in poetry of this period) of lovers’ faces reflected in each other’s eyes.

‘And true plain hearts do in the faces rest;’ – The expression in the faces of the lovers is unquestionably truthful.

‘Where can we find two better hemispheres’ – Just possibly, this refers to the eyes, but more likely the faces of the lovers.

‘Without sharp north, without declining west?’ – ‘sharp north,’ meaning that there is no chill or coldness in their faces; ‘declining west’ implies no end to the bright day of their love.

‘Whatever dies, was not mix'd equally;/If our two loves be one, or thou and I/Love so alike that none can slacken, none can die.’ – According to the chemistry of the day, only two sorts of substance were everlasting: simple elements like water or air, or mixed compounds where the elements were mixed in exact equality. So wood would be an unequal mix of fire, earth etc., whereas diamond would be an equal mix. If the speaker and his beloved love one another exactly as much as the other, then their love will be similarly everlasting.

Language

The terseness of expression in this poem is particularly noteworthy. For example, the line, ‘And make one little room an everywhere’ deftly completes the rhyme pattern and expresses its thought with such economy. The resolution of the strong monosyllables ‘make one…room’ in the polysyllabic ‘everywhere’ is particularly effective.