Are we done Donne?

The pros of marrying a poet? Instead of a simple 2-syllable "goodbye", you get a lovely 9-stanza poem: "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" - written by John Donne, presumably for his wife on the night of their separation.

The highlight of the poem definitely lies in the last three stanzas of the well-developed metaphysical metaphor of a compass to symbolize the spiritual link between two parted lovers. I have never related a compass to anything near love or romance before I read this. At first it seems strange to compare a couple to a tool like this, but the way Donne puts the metaphor let this all makes sense. As one of the most famous metaphysical poets, Donne demonstrated his skills of creating comparison between things that don't normally relate.

One foot of a compass is fixed, and it only moves when the other foot does. Although it stays on one point, the foot leans to the direction of which the other foot moves to. It is only because it stays still that the other foot can get back to where it started at, and that a perfect circle can be drawn. Similarly, one of the two lovers stay and the other leaves as the two separate. Nonetheless, they stay connected through all the distance. Their firm love for each other makes it possible for their love and reunion to be perfect and eternal just like a circle which has no beginning and no end - "Thy firmness makes my circle just, | And makes me end, where I begun" (35-36).

Now, we're done Donne.