The Perfume by John Donne (1633)

Name: The Perfume
Author: John Donne

The speaker has been caught with his beloved only once, yet is now blamed for every prior secret meeting, interrogated like a thief confronted by all those he might have robbed, seized by her "hydroptic father." Though the father has long spied with glazed, suspicious eyes, as if hunting a cockatrice, and has sworn to strip his daughter of her beauty and disinherit her if the speaker were ever seen with her, the two lovers had kept their affair as close and secret as their own souls. The beloved's mother, though bedridden and seemingly near death, refuses to die and instead uses her illness as cover to stay awake through the night watching her daughter's comings and goings; when she takes her daughter's hand under the guise of affection, she actually searches for rings and bracelets, kisses her to check the color of her face, embraces her out of fear she is pregnant, invents strange foods to see if she craves them, and studies her paleness, blushes, sighs, and sweats. She even slyly confesses her own youthful lustiness to draw out a confession. Yet love overcame these tricks, and the daughter deceived her own mother for the speaker's sake. The young siblings, who used to skip into the lovers' chamber at night like fairy sprites and play innocently on their father's knee, were bribed the next day to report what they had seen, but could reveal nothing. The enormous, iron-bound serving-man who guards the first gate, so huge the speaker fears meeting him even in hell, was likewise hired by the father but could never testify to any touch or kiss between them. It was, instead, an ordinary and humiliating betrayal that exposed the speaker: a loud perfume he wore, which cried out at his very entrance into the father's nose, giving them away. The father, startled like a tyrant king smelling gunpowder in his bed, went pale and trembling; had it been an ordinary bad smell he would have blamed his own feet or breath, but living on an island where only cattle and various dogs are bred, he found the unfamiliar scent as suspicious as men who call unicorns monstrous simply for being strange. The speaker recalls how he had trained his silks not to rustle and kept even his shoes silent, yet the perfume he had placed beside him betrayed him, fleeing invisibly to the father while somehow also remaining on him. The speaker then curses perfume as a base, worthless substance that confuses the senses, unable to distinguish the sick from the healthy. Through it, the foolish lover draws in death by inhaling a diseased harlot's breath, and men are branded effeminate. Though it is prized in princes' halls, this only shows how appearance is valued over substance there; the gods themselves were pleased by burnt offerings on their altars not because they liked the smell, but because the offering was consumed. Perfume, he argues, is loathsome when judged alone, so it makes no sense to love foul things in combination while condemning each part separately. Any good in it fades quickly, and its very rareness only heightens the loss when it decays. He closes by declaring he will gladly give up his own perfumes now, offering them instead to embalm the father's corpse, and asks, mockingly, whether the father will actually die.

By John Donne · First published 1633 · Genre: Poetry, Metaphysical Poetry, Love Poetry · 916 words

First lines

Once, and but once, found in thy company, / All thy supposed escapes are laid on me; / And as a thief at bar is question'd there / By all the men that have been robb'd that year, / So am I-by this traitorous means surprised- / By thy hydroptic father catechized. / Though he had wont to search with glazèd eyes, / As though he came to kill a cockatrice; / Though he hath oft sworn that he would remove / Thy beauty's beauty, and food of our love, / Hope of his goods, if I with thee were seen, / Yet close and secret, as our souls, we've been. / Though thy immortal mother, which doth lie / Still buried in her bed, yet will not die, / Takes this advantage to sleep out daylight, / And watch thy entries and returns all night; / And, when she takes thy hand, and would seem kind, / Doth search what rings and armlets she can find; / And kissing notes the colour of thy face; / And fearing lest thou'rt swollen, doth thee embrace; / And to try if thou long, doth name strange meats; / And notes thy paleness, blushing, sighs, and sweats; / And politicly will to thee confess / The sins of her own youth's rank lustiness; / Yet love these sorceries did remove, and move / Thee to gull thine own mother for my love. / Thy little brethren, which like fairy sprites / Oft skipp'd into our chamber, those sweet nights, / And kiss'd, and ingled on thy father's knee, / Were bribed next day to tell what they did see; / The grim-eight-foot-high-iron-bound serving-man, / That oft names God in oaths, and only then, / He that, to bar the first gate, doth as wide / As the great Rhodian Colossus stride / -Which, if in hell no other pains there were, / Makes me fear hell, because he must be there- / Though by thy father he were hired to this, / Could never witness any touch or kiss. / But O! too common ill, I brought with me / That, which betray'd me to mine enemy, / A loud perfume, which at my entrance cried / E'en at thy father's nose; so were we spied. / When, like a tyrant king, that in his bed / Smelt gunpowder, the pale wretch shivered, / Had it been some bad smell, he would have thought / That his own feet, or breath, that smell had wrought; / But as we in our isle imprisoned, / Where cattle only and divers dogs are bred, / The precious unicorns strange monsters call, / So thought he good strange, that had none at all. / I taught my silks their whistling to forbear; / Even my oppress'd shoes dumb and speechless were; / Only thou bittersweet, whom I had laid / Next me, me traitorously hast betray'd, / And unsuspected hast invisibly / At once fled unto him, and stay'd with me. / Base excrement of earth, which dost confound / Sense from distinguishing the sick from sound! / By thee the silly amorous sucks his death / By drawing in a leprous harlot's breath; / By thee, the greatest stain to man's estate / Falls on us, to be call'd effeminate; / Though you be much loved in the prince's hall, / There things that seem exceed substantial; / Gods, when ye fumed on altars, were pleased well, / Because you were burnt, not that they liked your smell; / You're loathsome all, being taken simply alone; / Shall we love ill things join'd, and hate each one? / If you were good, your good doth soon decay; / And you are rare; that takes the good away: / And my perfumes I give most willingly / To embalm thy father's corpse; what? will he die?

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The Perfume is listed on Textopian as a poem by John Donne, dated 1633 CE.

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Work type: Poem
Author: John Donne
Date: 1633 CE
Language: English
Genres: Poetry, Metaphysical Poetry, Love Poetry, Lyric Poetry, Satirical Poetry
Length: 916 words
Structure: 1 section, 1 paragraphs
Reading fit: Difficult (College Level)

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Genres

Poetry — The work is a verse composition with a formal rhyme scheme and metrical structure, employing traditional poetic devices and language.
Metaphysical Poetry — Donne is a defining metaphysical poet; the work features characteristic wit, elaborate conceits (perfume as betrayer), paradoxes, and intellectual complexity central to the metaphysical tradition.
Love Poetry — The poem centers on romantic love and desire between two lovers, with the narrative focused on obstacles to their secret relationship and emotional consequence of discovery.
Lyric Poetry — The work expresses the speaker's personal emotion, frustration, and intimate reflection through first-person voice and subjective emotional intensity rather than narrative progression.