Beginning of Essay
The consensus was that the poem's speaker is attempting to persuade "His Coy Mistress" to have sex with him. The speaker seems frustrated, impatient, and to feel a sense of urgency in pursuing this goal. Some students argued that the speaker's words are mostly e ....

Middle of Essay
.... the couple will turn the tables on time, but it's not clear if this idea is, again, empty rhetoric. A variation on this interpretation is that the speaker wants not only sex, but also to develop the spiritual aspects of their relationship--the two go together. In this view, his high-flown speech (especially in the first section) expresses the extremeness of his commitment to her. From this perspective, the speaker's final proposal about the lovers' taking control of their own fate (taking that control away from time) could be meant sincerely. Throughout the class discussions, it became clear that this poem offers a particular view of gender rela ....