The structure of a Ghazal
Key themes in the poem are the sexual desire of the lover also love and separation.
The poem consists of ten stanzas, each of two lines. The first couplet rhymes, as does the last and throughout the poem.
Khalvati makes use of many metaphorical scenarios to illustrate love also desire. For example, “You are the rhyme and I the refrain” and “I rise in the east as you die in the west” are typical examples of this. ‘East’ and ‘West’ are opposite to each other on a compass, yet one would not exist in the same significant way without the other, it would not be balanced. This shows the speaker’s desire for her anonymous lover. The poem oozes a sense of pleasure and sexual desire. The speaker repeatedly expresses the urge to be united, physically and emotionally, with her anonymous lover and the poem is filled with imagery which suggests what pleasure that will come once the speaker and lover are reunited. The poem demonstrates the intensity of desire and love, and also expresses the desire to be united both physically and spiritually; as I don’t believe the lover is in the speaker’s presence. Many of the couplets begin with ‘if’ so it seems that Khalvati is imagining or fantasizing about what she wants to happen in this relationship. The metaphors she uses are things that naturally go together or two things that are closely associated with each other or the two opposites which without one another would not happen. For example ‘if I am the rose and you the bird, then woo me’ which is a contrast as the rose needs the bird to survive through pollination and vice versa. "Be heaven and earth to me and I'll be twice the me” is a key line in the poem. It expresses the speaker's opinion that by receiving the love of the person they desire they will become greater, as if having the love of another is a powerful force which increases a person's worth.
‘Carpe Diem’ which is the phrase which effectively means seize the day is definitely a theme in this poem as Marvell often portrays time to be an object in the way of his love and desire for his mistress. In the first couple of lines Marvell says ‘had we but world enough, and time, this coyness, Lady, were no crime’ this means that his mistress is being very shy and almost flirtatious towards the lover which usually wouldn’t be a problem but as time isn’t on their side it is. This shows that the lover has much desire to be with the mistress. From line 13 Marvell talks about how the lover would spend ‘a hundred years to praise