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Poem Analysis : “The Broken Heart” by John Donne


“The Broken Heart”
by John Donne

He is stark mad, who ever says,
That he hath been in love an hour,
Yet not that love so soon decays,
But that it can ten in less space devour;
Who will believe me, if I swear
That I have had the plague a year ?
Who would not laugh at me, if I should say,
I saw a flask of powder burn a day ?

Ah, what trifle is a heart,
If once into Love’s hands it come!
All other griefs allow a part
To other griefs, and ask themselves but some,
They come to us, but us Love draws,
He swallows us, and never chaws:
By him, as by chain-shot, whole ranks do die,
He is the tyrant pike, our hearts the fry.

If`there not so, what did become
Of my heart, when I first saw thee ?
I brought a heart into the room,
But from the room, I carried non with me;
If it had gone to thee, I know
Mine would have taught thy heart to show
More pity unto me: but Love, alas,
At one first blow did shiver it as glass

POEM ANALYSIS

      Sound
“The Broken Heart” consists of 4 stanzas.Utilize The line-stress pattern, therefore, is 44454455 in each stanza.Each stanza follows a rhyme scheme of ABABCCDD.

Speaker
a)The speaker’s personality : Anxious,Desperate,Broken-hearted.
b)Point of view : First person of view ( I,They)
 c)Tone : Low (Sad)
d)Gender : Male (He,They)

Purpose
       The author expressed that he has been in love for an hour is insane;  because love “decays” in so short a time.It means that he was broken heart because he lost his feeling to someone he loved.“What a trifle is a heart,” the speaker says.Unlike love, other feelings and other griefs do not demand the entire heart, only a part of it. Love draws us to it, swallowing us whole.
      Addressing his beloved, the author asks her a question: What if he said about love is fake, then what happened to his heart when the first time he saw her? If anyone wants to doubt the power of love, the author offers up his own experience as proof. Now,This beloved person stole his heart awayThe power of love smashed his heart into a million little pieces.What a broken-hearted man! (like The script’s song – The man who can’t be moved ).
     “Who will believe me, if I swear,that I have had the plague a year ? “ it means that move on from her is like a plague which consumed his soul over a year. He said that he entered the room with a heart, and left the room without one.It seems that he has just realized that love is evil.True love is only once,but fake love is everywhere.If his heart had been captivated whole by her, he says, it would have the impact of love shattered his heart. Evidence : “More pity unto me: but Love, alas,At one first blow did shiver it as glass”.Still, he said, a thing can be so utterly destroyed then it becomes nothing; like the pieces of his shattered heart.The author said that his experience of the shock of “one such love,”.He can never love again.
     The first stanza is about the  idea of the poem by showing that to be in love for an entire hour would be like having the plague for a year or seeing a flask of gunpowder burn for an entire day.It means that love is instant, like the explosion of the flask. The second stanza declares that love is a kind of monster that destroys human beings, devouring men. Evidence : (“He is the tyrant pike, our hearts the fry”).
       In the third stanza, the author addressed to the one he loved and recalling the moment when love destroyed his heart.The last stanza gives a kind of moral value for the poem, the opening (“nothing can to nothing fall, / Nor any place be empty quite”) and detailing what happens to a heart after it has been shattered by love.He needs such as a hope and affection, but never again to love.
        Throughout, “The Broken Heart” of John Donne’s poem is often difficult to understand.Language is full of metaphorical and imagery,but once the basic idea is grasped, most of the conceptual elements of the poem is easy to know.At least,you know the meaning sense of this poem.What a beautiful poem!


-Arief Nuryanto/16202241043-


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