‘Twickenham Garden’ is a metaphysical poetry

John Donne is one of the most famous poets of the seventeenth century. He has been highly acclaimed for his metaphysical poems and he is considered as the pioneer of the metaphysical poets. Many poets used to write poems in this technique, but he was the major metaphysical poet because of his writing style.

 

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‘Twickenham Garden’ is a metaphysical poem written by him. The poem is written addressing the home of Lucy, the Countess of Bedford. This fair lady was the patroness of John Donne. By conceiving a fruitless love for her, he has misunderstood their friendship. So, the poem is like an autobiographical lyric describing the personal experience of the poet. Before going to discuss metaphysical poetry, we should know its definition at first.

The word “Metaphysic” can be divided into two parts- “meta”, which means beyond, and “physic”, which means physical. It actually indicates the things or ideas that are not in physical form. Some of the important characteristics are given below-

1.   Language of the poem should be ordinary and it will be combined with puns, paradoxes and conceits.

2.   Poems will be written in the form of dramatic monologue. It means there will be only one speaker and one listener who has no physical existence.

3.   In love poetry, while showing the relationship between soul and body and the union of lovers’ souls, they take the concept from Renaissance Neo-Platonism.

4.   It shows the development of wit, a sense of fancy and originality in figures of speech.

5.   While describing the concept of love, poets try to show the realism of psychology.

6.   It should have a sudden start.

7.   There should be the use of hyperbole.

The most important characteristic of metaphysical poetry is that it starts suddenly and we can see the same thing happening in this poem too. The poem has started suddenly describing the poet’s state of mind and there is only mention of his inner turmoil. He said, “Blasted with sighs, and surrounded with tears.”

Here, the poet says that he is tormented by his suffering that he is surrounded by his tears. Here ‘sighs’ and ‘tears’ can be interpreted as metaphors for ‘wind’ and ‘rain’. It is also the example of Donne’s hyperbole.

Another important characteristic is dramatic monologue. Dramatic monologue is a type of poetry where there will be one speaker revealing his incident that makes up the whole of the poem to a person who is not physically present. In this poem, readers can find one speaker and he is perhaps the poet himself.

In this poem, John Donne has beautifully demonstrated the use of metaphysical conceit. This literary term can be seen in the first stanza of this poem. The poet said,

“The spider Love, which transubstantiates all,
And can convert manna to gall.”

In these above-stated lines, the poet has compared his love with a dangerous and poisonous thing like spider. He said that his love is like a spider love, which can transform anything into poisonous. Even it can convert a heavenly food into bitter.

Actually, it indicates triangle love. He has fallen in love with a woman who is already married. He knew that he cannot have this beautiful woman. Because of his one-sided love, he does not like the love that exists between her and her husband.

In the last two lines of the first stanza, readers can get the use of metaphysical conceit when the poet brilliantly compares himself to the serpent of Eden. He said,

“And that this place may thoroughly be thought
True paradise, I have the serpent brought.”

In these lines, the poet said that he has brought a serpent with him in the shape of “love” that will give the similar appearance of this garden to the Garden of Eden. Here, the writer with the word “serpent” mentions about painful thoughts and memories of love. Being a serpent, Donne turns a perfect place into a place of expulsion, grief and absence.

The reason for comparing himself to the serpent is because he is jealous of the married couple and he wants to tempt Lucy into being unfaithful to her partner. It is a Biblical reference. When Adam and Eve were in Paradise, Satan took the form of a serpent and tempted Eve and this resulted in the fall of Man.

In the second stanza, Donne has used “stone fountain” as a metaphysical conceit. He said,

“Make me a mandrake, so I may grow here,
Or a stone fountain weeping out my year.”

The poet prayed to God to convert himself into a mandrake plant or a stone fountain so that he can shed tears in the form of jets of water throughout the year.

The main reason is that he wants to forget the memories of Lucy. As he is unable to turn Lucy against her husband, he is full of anguish and hopeless. He even prefers to be an unimportant part of Lucy’s world rather than being nothing at all. His tears come because of his hatred feeling towards Lucy’s marriage and because he still loves her knowing that she cannot accept his love.

The writer has not only used metaphysical conceit but also he has brilliantly used natural images. At the beginning of the poem, readers can find a very beautiful description of nature. He said, “Hither I come to seek the spring.”

He comes to nature to get relief from his torment by enjoying the beauty of natural objects. But natural sights and sounds fail to cure the suffering of his heart. It is because he has brought with him the thoughts of love into the garden.

With the use of natural image, Donne has wonderfully depicted his state of depression and isolation and the inner turmoil he suffers from falling in love with a woman he cannot have.

The second stanza of this poem can also be considered as the best example of natural image. He has used natural image to show his current state of mind and emotion. He said,

“Twere wholesomer for me that winter did
Benight the glory of this place,
And that a grave frost did forbid
These trees to laugh and mock me to my face.”

These lines indicate that trees were laughing at the grief and despair of the poet. For this reason, he wants the winter to destroy the beauty and charm of this place. He wishes that a thick frost would have covered the trees of this garden so that trees should not have made fun of his suffering.

This short poem also contains many symbols. The word “Mandrake” carries a very important symbolic meaning. He said, “Make me a mandrake, so I may grow here.” 

Mandrake is a tree, which is half-human and half-plant. The name of this tree is mentioned in classic novels. It is said to have groaned when it is wounded. However, mandrake trees are most often seen symbolizing males. The poet wants to be a mandrake tree so that he can groan here.

Another symbol that has equal importance in this poem is “love's wine”, which symbolizes the poet’s tears. He said,

“Hither with crystal phials, lovers, come,

And take my tears, which are love's wine.”

He said that his tears come from true love. For this reason, he invites lovers to come with bottles of glass, and after filling them with tears, take them home and compare them to the tears of their lovers.

In the poem ‘Twickenham Garden’, readers can find Donne’s negative attitude towards women. Third stanza is the best example that shows his hatred for women. He has taken the help of some images to show the unfaithful characteristics of women. He said,

“For all are false, that taste not just like mine.
Alas ! hearts do not in eyes shine,
Nor can you more judge women's thoughts by tears,
Than by her shadow what she wears.”

At the beginning of this stanza, the poet calls lovers to come with a bottle of glass and fill it with his tears. He also tells them to compare it with those tears shedding by their beloved. If they do not taste the same then the love of their beloved is not true. With the words “all are false”, he is actually referring to all women whose love is not genuine to their beloved.

He also said that the true feelings of a woman’s heart cannot be judged by the tears which flow out of her eyes as they can shed false tears. Either directly or indirectly, he mentioned that ‘truth’, ‘honesty’ etc. are a rare virtue of womanhood. Readers get a clear idea of Donne’s scornful attitude towards women. His view of women is totally opposite to the view expressed in most of his love poems.

He has boldly portrayed the negative side of women. What message we get from his view is that women are neither goddess nor fully honest. They have all the shortcomings as a human being. Readers can find Donne’s materialistic, negative, and occasionally misogynistic idea.

Readers can find John Donne’s anti-Petrarchan thought about women. He did not bother about portraying the negative side of women. In this poem, readers can find women as ordinary human beings full of flaws or errors. It means that he has depicted women in opposite way of what the followers of the Petrarchan tradition have shown women in their poems. It should be known to all that followers of the Petrarchan tradition treated women as virtuous or goddess. Their main concern was to portray the beauty and positive sides of women.

Like other poems of John Donne, the main theme of ‘Twickenham Garden’ is also love for woman. Here, readers get his cynical view of love. Readers also find him as a passionate lover who is in love with a married woman he cannot have. While he was addressing his love for Lucy, we find a sad tone in his voice.

The poet with his sad and dejected mood entered into the garden in the Spring season to get some pleasure by enjoying natural sights and sounds. But the beauty of nature fails to cure his suffering as he enters the garden with him bringing the thought of love. It should be noted here that Spring is the season of love and new life.

His suffering because of Lucy’s rejection of accepting his love has got the main importance in this poem. Until he compares his beloved with other women, we can find his negative attitude towards women. According to him, all women are false because their tears do not taste like his. However, his beloved is the only exception among them. She is so much true and honest to her husband that she has denied Donne’s passionate love and this has caused his suffering.

The closing lines are the most important lines of this poem. In these two lines, Donne compares Lucy with all women and proves that the girl he loves is better than anyone. He said,

“O perverse sex, where none is true but she,
Who's therefore true, because her truth kills me.”

In these above-mentioned lines, he said that his beloved is not like other women who are false and deceptive. His beloved is faithful to a single lover. Her truthfulness to her husband has become the reason for his suffering.

The last two lines are totally opposite of what he so far said in this poem. It shows his contradictory thought about love and woman. It shows his paradoxical thought.

In conclusion, it can be said that ‘Twickenham Garden’ is undoubtedly a metaphysical poem because the whole poem deals with nothing but human feelings. It is much clear that his poem is more about spiritual love rather than physical love. True love is possible when there will be unity between body and soul. It is proved that it has all the qualities to be a metaphysical poem.