Donne's Twickenham Garden

[Fishinatank]

Hi,
Can anyone help me? I'm looking for notes or analysis on John Donne's Twickenham Garden. I'm so confused!
Thanks,
- Fish.

[mirrorstars]

We studied this in class, and were told that poets like Donne were often commissioned by nobles to write poems. Twickenham Garden is one such poem, addressed to the wife of a noble.
Thus, Donne is imagining an unrequited love to this woman.

When he says: "O perverse sex, where none is true but she,
Who's therefore true, because her truth kills me."

He is being ironic. He's saying that all women are unfaithful, and yet the one woman he wants, is the one woman who actually is faithful.

The imagery surrounding the Garden of Eden, the exile, and the change of the seasons (Winter) is quite easy to grasp.
Basically, he's trying to show this woman in the best light possible.

[ell]

Hi, I would just like to correct something; poets were indeed commissioned to write poems for nobility, however, John Donne did not write for the public (apart from a select few, such as the Countess of Bedford for example). His poetry was actually published after his death.