Metaphysical poets

Sometimes used in the broad sense of philosophical poetry the term is used to designate the world of the 17th century writers. They formed a school in the sense of employing similar methods and of being actuated by a spirit of revolt against the romantic conventionalism of Elizabethan love poetry, in particular the Petrarchan conceit.
Their tendency towards psychological analysis of the emotions, of love and religion, their interest for the novel and the shocking, their use of metaphysical conceits, and the extremes to which they sometimes carried their techniques resulted frequently in obscurity, rough verse and strained imagery.
The characteristics of the best metaphysical poetry are:
Logical elements in a technique intended to express honestly, if not unconventionally, the poet's sense of the complexities and contradictions of life.
The poetry of the metaphysical is:
Intellectual
Analytical
Psychological
Disillusioning
Bold
Absorbed in thoughts of death
Physical love
Religious devotion

The imagery is drawn from the common place of the remote, actual life or erudite resources, the figure itself being elaborated with self conscious ingenuity.
The form is frequently that of AN ARGUMENT OF THE POET WITH HIS LOVER, WITH GOD OR WITH HIMSELF.

A Valediction Forbidding Mourning (un addio che proibisce i lamenti) by John Donne

Mildly -> senza caos

The poet starts the poem with a comparison; he considers people who die without making noise and he calls them virtuous. He also says the virtuous person's friends are sad, but they are silent.

The poet is talking to his lover.
Presence of hyperboles -> parody of the conventions of the courteous love poetry

When lovers depart, there is usually a lot of crying.
Sigh tempests -> parody and hyperbole -> invites his lover not to sigh (sighs are so frequent that they make a tempest)

Laity -> gente comune

The poet is inviting his lover not to cry for his departure; he compares his departure with that of dying men.
The use of terms is a clear parody of courteous poetry (e.g. sighs are taken to an extreme)

Moving of Earth -> earthquake
Donne resorts to the language of geology; love is compared to subjects which are usually far from the language of poetry.
The poem itself is a dialogue between two lovers, one of them departing.

Trepidation of the spheres -> the "sphere" is planet Earth, while "trepidation" is usually referred to someone's heart -> anthropomorphization
Exaggeration of the effects of love

Dull sublunary sense -> physical love is senseless without a spiritual part
Sublunary -> geographical references
If love were just physical, it should not admit the lover's absence
The poet will not suffer so much because of his departure, since his love is mostly spiritual.

Distance is not a break, but an expansion of love.

-> Image of a piece of gold which is beaten -> simile
Gold is a precious metal, so this simile reinforces their love

Comparison between love and a compass -> the feet of the compass are different, but always united -> the two lovers do make a single entity
The fixed foot is the speaking voice's lover, the other foot is the speaking voice (who must go away)
At the end of the travel, the two lovers will be united once more; when we have drawn a circle with the compass, the two feet of the compass are put again one next to the other.