The Flea EMS

The Flea, by John Donne, tells of a husband trying to have sexual relations with his wife. To make his point as to why they should have these sexual relations, he uses the example of a flea who has sucked the blood out of the pair, and "in this flea our two blood mingled be". The husband tells how the mixing of these bodily fluids is not a big deal through lines such as "Thou know'st that this cannot be said / A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead". We then have a turn, when the wife kills this flea, in the line "Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence?" The husband then flips this situation on her, asking her what the flea did wrong, "Except in that drop which it suck'd from thee?" And even though the wife has had her blood mingled, the husband argues that the wife is not weaker at all from the experience, and then says "then learn how false fears be". He ends by saying that when having sex, the wife will lose as much honor as how much life she lost from the flea dying.

The original question I had after reading this poem was whether the husband and wife had sex already. It seems from looking at the poem, though, that they had already. The line "nor loss of maidenhead" seems to suggest the wife is not a virgin already. When you add that with the line "Though parents grudge, and you, we're met", it suggests through "we're met" that they have had sex, and it can possibly be read that it was a forced marriage due to premarital sex. And could this premarital sex have led to a baby? There is certainly baby imagery through the flea, a third party, containing the mixed blood of the two parents. I don't feel like this is the case, although an argument could certainly be said that abortion is included in the poem, as the wife seems to have killed the flea, potentially meaning that she killed the child.