Death be not proud Explication

"Death---the last sleep? No the final awakening." - Walter Scott

In John Donne's poem Death, be not proud, the speaker basically tells Death to go f*** himself, but in a diplomatic, religious way. The speaker through the use of smack talk and name calling, tries to get under Death's skin. 

In line five the speaker compares Death to rest and sleep.These are two very nonthreatening things, and when you kill people for a living you would prefer to strike fear in the hearts of many. "Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men," (Line 9) The speaker calls death a slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men. He suggests that death does not work of his own free will, but is controlled by people like a slave. Slaves are weak; when you are supposed to be this macho, scary guy, you don't want to be compared to a slave by anyone. "And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell;" (Line 10) The speaker tells death that people die because of these reasons, the 'people' that deaths hangs out with, not Death himself. 

The speaker is a man of assured faith that does not fear death. His faith in God is what gives him the strength to stand up to death because he knows that death is just like a little nap and he will wake up in the presence of the eternal father. "One short sleep passed, we wake eternally, And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die." (Lines 13-14) The Christian faith believes that once you die, you aren't really dead, just sleeping. You sleep until Judgment Day. Once Judgement Day arrives, Jesus Christ will take all good Christians to reside in Heaven for eternity. 

Death, be not proud is a Patrarchan sonnet, therefore it is closer to the Italian sonnet. Donne does play around with the form a little. The traditional Patrarchan sonnet has a rhyme scheme that goes ABBAABBA CDCDCD. The last six lines in Donne's poem however, seem to follow the rhyme scheme of CDDCAA. Though for the last words of the last two lines to rhyme, you would have to pronounce eternally as eternal-lie. Since no one is entirely sure what Renaissance English sounds like, it is quite possible that they did pronounce words like that. The last six lines could also follow the rhyme arrangement CDDC AE. With the volta ending in AE the rhyming of A relates it back to the beginning of the poem. While the E rhyme gives the poem a whole new idea, the turn. In traditional Italian sonnets, the turn happens in line 9. In Death, be not proud, the turn occurs in middle of the last line. "Death, thou shalt die." In the entire poem, the speaker is basically trash talking Death, calling him names and telling Death that he isn't afraid of him. In this last line he tells Death that he will die. He doesn't tell Death that he should die, he tells Death that he will die.