John Donne's "The Flea" and Andrew Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress" are poems with very similar underlying messages. They each have a male speaker and in each poem, the narrator is trying to persuade a young woman to relinquish her virginity. Although the message is obfuscated with poetic language, it is really no different from what a guy might say today in order to seduce a girl. Each poem gives the man's subtle argument on why the woman should succumb to his pressure. In "The Flea," the speaker tries to convince the woman that having sex would be no worse than a mere fleabite whereas the speaker in "To His Coy Mistress" is basically telling the woman that life is so short and they should have sex while they are both still young and attractive. Although the literary language may soften the actual message, both poems are essentially about a man trying to allure a woman to have premarital sex against her good judgment. The literary language will also have an effect the women's responses.
             In "The Flea" by John Donne, the speaker's main argument is that both of their bloods have already mingled in the flea so it would not make a difference if they were to have intercourse. He claims that if they were to do it, the harm caused would be equal to that of a mere fleabite when he says "Thou know'st that this cannot be said/ A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead" (664). He is lessening the significance of losing one's virginity. The poem starts out with the speaker getting bitten by a flea. Then the same flea goes and bites the woman with whom he lays. In those days, it was a common medical belief that conception occurred through the mingling of the blood of a man and a woman. He's saying that by getting bitten by the same flea, it is almost as if they have had sex already. The speaker takes this into account when he is trying to convin...