When initially reading this poem, I thought it had a mournful tone to it. The speaker appeared to lament on how time was fleeting and makes the message to treasure every moment. The narration then elaborates that to treasure love, one would need make out…a lot in order to do so. The juxtaposition in lines 33-36 ( “while the youthful hue / Sits on thy skin like morning dew, / And while thy willing soul transpires / At every pore with instant fires”) stands out to me by displaying youth as an example to experience drastic decisions in life. The pores with fires is another way of basically saying making love. He feels that if people don’t express themselves, they’ll die hiding their true emotions from each other, he may have experienced or seen this happen, and wants to warn readers about the finality of death. 

At the same time, though, how he uses imagery to vividly describe love is interesting. He unapologetically describes the process of having sex as a way of making a mark in the world. It feels very similar to the way Shakespeare wrote his “Make babies!” poem, but some of the differences I feel comes to tone: Shakespeare may have filled his poem humor in describing this, but Marvell’s way of expressing it here is blunt and more urgent. It makes me wonder whether the speaker in Coy Mistress comes across as more lustful or more desperate in his message.