To His Coy Mistress :: Literary Analysis

In the poem â€Å"To His Coy Mistress†, the speaker is trying to seduce his wife. In the assumption the mistress is his wife; she is being bashful towards losing her virginity. The speaker, which is the mistress’s husband, develops a carefully constructed argument where the speaker seeks to persuade his lady to surrender her virginity to him. In the poem â€Å"To His Coy Mistress†, the speaker says, â€Å"Had we but world enough, and time†¦I would love you ten years before the Flood, and you should if you please refuse till the conversion of the Jews† (lines 1 and 7-10). The speaker is stating if they had all the time in the world, they would have no need to rush their love making. With all the time they would want he would love her from the very beginning until the very end. The speaker refers to the â€Å"Flood† (line 8) as the flood of Noah’s Arc in the Bible, which indicates he would love her from the beginning of time. Next, the speaker says, â€Å"Till the conversion of the Jews† (line 10), which would indicate the end of time. In the Bible, it is believed that when Christ comes back for his people the Jews will convert to Christianity. Therefore when Christ returns, that will be the end times. In conclusion, the speaker is saying if they had time from the beginning to the very end, his mistress is welcome to continue being shy. In contrary, the speaker and his coy mistress do not have that kind of time to spare, which is the reason he is trying to convince his wife to surrender her virginity. The speaker continues to argue that time is not in favor of his mistress’s nervousness or his age. For instance, he says, â€Å"But at my back I always hear time’s winged chariot hurrying near† (lines 21 and 22). In other words, he is saying his time is running out quickly. There can be many reasons why his time is running short, but according to the poem there is one reason he could be in a rush to make love with his mistress. The speaker says, â€Å"And yonder all before us lie deserts of vast eternity† (lines 23 and 24). â€Å"Deserts of vast eternity† (line 24) expresses his concern of not being able to have children, which would make him sterile. As men age, their sperm count becomes less and less, which makes conceiving a child nearly impossible.