Poem: The Flea by John Donne The Norton Anthology of English Literature defines the "conceits" of poetics as metaphors that are intricately woven into the verse, often used to express satire, puns, or deeper meanings within the poem, and to display the poet's own cunning with words. The conceits of John Donne are said to "leap continually in a restless orbit from the personal to the cosmic and back again." The outward nature of Donne's …showed first 75 words of 1152 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1152 total…she is a noble and he is not, so the suggestion that they mix blood is highly insulting, or that the entire subject he is discussing is not modest enough for a maiden. Upon her smashing of his poetic world of marriage and love, the man assures her that what she has done is of no consequence. He compares her fear for her honor to the importance of the now dead flea, which is nothing.