Analysis of Holy Sonnet IX: If Poisonous Minerals, And If That Tree

John Donne 1572 (London) – 1631 (London)



If poisonous minerals, and if that tree
Whose fruit threw death on else immortal us,
If lecherous goats, if serpents envious
Cannot be damned, alas, why should I be?
Why should intent or reason, born in me,
Make sins, else equal, in me more heinous?
And Mercy being easy, and glorious
To God; in his stern wrath, why threatens he?
But who am I, that dare dispute with thee
O God? Oh! of thine only worthy blood,
And my tears, make a heavenly Lethean flood,
And drown in it my sin's black memory;
That thou remember them, some claim as debt,
I think it mercy, if thou wilt forget.


Scheme ABBAABBAACCADD
Poetic Form
Metre 11001000111 1111110101 11001110100 1011011111 1101110101 1111001110 01010100100 1101111101 1111110111 1111110101 0111010011 0101111100 1101011111 1111011101
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 574
Words 111
Sentences 7
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 14
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 32
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 444
Words per stanza (avg) 109
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

33 sec read
186

John Donne

John Donne was an English poet, satirist, lawyer and a cleric in the Church of England. more…

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