Metaphysical poetry swept through the world on the heels of the Renaissance. In an England where religious turmoil meant a person was not sure whether to be Catholic or Protestant in any given year, this type of poetry concerned itself with the whole experience of man. But the intelligence, learning and seriousness of the metaphysical poets means that their works are about the profound areas of experience; especially about love and about man's relationship with God and the eternal perspective. Helen Gardner states in her book the introduction to The Metaphysical Poets, "A metaphysical poem tends to be brief, and is always tightly woven" (Penguin). Poems in this genre also share many different characteristics. At the center of the poem, one will find a short and simple truth that can then be expanded to form another truth. At its heart lies "the classical epigram, and there is some truth in saying the poem is an expanded epigram." Caron Andregg also emphasizes that metaphysical poems contain a central conceit: "An extended metaphor so contrived and intellectually convoluted that, while the reader must in the end acknowledge the comparison between two unlike things, the very unlikeness remains paramount" (Andregg, par. 2). Metaphysical poems contain central conceits because they are derived on the experience of man. Not only on day-to-day experience, but also on a profound experience as well. This profound experience is demonstrated through love - romantic and sensual; and a man's relationship with God - the eternal perspective and forgiveness of sins. Perhaps the greatest profound metaphysical writer of religious experience was John Donne. In his religious poems, John Donne expresses the attributes of metaphysical literature.
             John Donne was born in London in 1572 to a prosperous Roman Catholic family. When John was four-years-old, his father died and left him and his two ...