To His Coy Mistress
“Coy” refers to a woman who is reluctant (=widerwillig) to give in to her lover’s plea (to make love). The purpose of the poem is to convince this lady and to make her agree to physical love. As a result of this purpose the poem is given a very special, argumentative structure. Marvell uses couplets which give the poem a regular and harmonious quality and rhythm. The essential / central message of this poem is “Carpe Diem”, “Seize the day”, which means: “don’t stand and watch your life pass by. Make your like happen”. Marvell puts this into a very polished, lighthearted poem.
1) The first part establishes a hypothesis, which is a statement that is not based on facts, but on an imaginary life. If the two of them (the speaker and his mistress) had all the time in the world, there would be no need to rush / hurry. Then they could take ages to express their love by merely looking at each other. If this world belonged to them and if they had eternity Time at their disposal, the mistress’s reluctance would be no problem (=”no crime” l.2). They could sit, walk and talk, they could spend their time quietly and physical love could wait. She could be in India and collect precious stones (=”rubies l.6) and he, by contrast, would quite simply be stuck at home, “by Tide of Humber (l.6)” and spend his time waiting and “complaining” (l.7). This scene is very ironic, playful and humorous. Marvell uses a hyperbole to give this the funny, playful, lighthearted and humorous tone.

Then the speaker moves on by saying: “I would love you ten years before the Flood” (l.8). If you refer to the time before “the Flood” (=Sintflut), you focus on the beginning of the world, the time of Creation, and his mistress could refuse “until the conversion of the Jews” (l.10) (=the end of the world, the day of the Last Judgement, das Jüngste Gericht)

“My vegetable love should grow, Vaster than empires, and more slow” means that this love would not only grow endlessly, but