Analysis

The Good-Morrow, John Donne


I wonder, by my troth, what thou  and I
Did, till we loved? Were we not weaned (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.


Blue: An enjambment/run-on-lines, where the sentence is unfinished and the meaning are unfinished at the end of the verse.
Red: An alliteration, where two or more words that are close together start with the same letter.
Brown: Assonance, where similar sounds are repeated, in this case the u in "sucked", the o in "on" and the ou in "country".
Purple: A metaphor, which is a comparison without like or as. In verse 2, the discovery of their love is compared to the weaning (the act of stopping a child's breastfeeding) of the lovers.
The metaphor in verse 6-7 is the comparison of previous loves of the speaker and the beauty of his newest love.


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-discoverers to new worlds have gone,
Let maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown,
Let us possess one world, each hath one, and is one.


Red: More alliteration.
Silver: A hyperbole, which is an extreme exaggeration. In this case, the speaker's love is exaggerated, as it is physically impossible for it to control everything ot take up space.
Orange: An anaphora, which is when multiple following verses start with the same word.


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.


Brown: Assonance, in this case the i in "thine" and the word "eye" make the same sound.
Blue: Another enjambment.


(The Norton Anthology of Poetry Third Edition, 1983)