Donne's Poem Death Don't Be ProudIn the poem "Death Don't Be Proud", written by John Donne, death is personified. The personification of death creates the feeling that death is less powerful than we think. Donne creates an image of death that is not mysterious, uncontrolled, and a low-status slave. It does so by undermining the idea of ​​death as linked to the rules of "destiny, chance, kings and desperate men". He insists that death is no more powerful than any mortal is. The word slave suggests that death is not mysterious. Directed to death, “you are a slave” forms a non-threatening death position because slaves are non-threatening. This is due to the connections that accompany the word slave. A slave is bound into submission to a master, so he has no say in what he can do. Death, in being personified in a slave who has many masters, is more extremely related. This lack of freedom that death has in choosing its victims removes any reason to fear it. Power comes from the ability to control something. Here death is one controlled by other external forces that have power over how and when death can do its work. Death strikes fear into mortals because one does not know what happens in the afterlife. This poem creates the feeling that we know who death is. For example we can see how death is a poor beggar on the street. This would make death a non-threatening person. He is a low-class citizen who is just waiting for the opportunity to feast when his master allows it. Donne produces this low-level figure of death by associating it with "poison, war, and disease." These are all things less fortunate mortals deal with on a daily basis. These are terrible things that are not good. Death personified is subject to these horrible circumstances so he is very short in stature. If death can only get its revenge with such low standards governing it, then death is just as low as what it works for. Death becomes less mysterious and something we are not afraid of.