To His Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvell

"To His Coy Mistress" is a poem by the English poet Andrew Marvell. Most likely written in the 1650s in the midst of the English Interregnum, the poem was not published until the 1680s, after Marvell's death. "To His Coy Mistress" is a carpe diem poem: following the example of Roman poets like Horace, it urges a young woman to enjoy the pleasures of life before death claims her. Indeed, the poem is an attempt to seduce the titular "coy mistress." In the process, however, the speaker dwells with grotesque intensity on death itself. Death seems to take over the poem, displacing the speaker's erotic energy and filling the poem with dread.

1. To His Coy Mistress
by Andrew Marvell

‘To His Coy Mistress’ is one of the most
famous poems of the seventeenth century,
and probably the most famous poem
Andrew Marvell ever wrote. It’s a classic
seduction poem, which sees Marvell
endeavouring to persuade his would-be
lover, or ‘mistress’, to go to bed with him.
As well as being a seduction lyric, ‘To His
Coy Mistress’ is also a carpe diem poem,
which argues that we should ‘seize the
day’ because life is short. Here is
Marvell’s poem, followed by a brief
summary and analysis of its language and
meaning.