The writer John Donne's 17th-century poem 'The Flea' cleverly uses this insect as a metaphor

to show a sexual relationship between a man and a woman. The flea is a poem written by
John Donne in which it is all about one man trying to get a woman to have sex with him. The
flea has bitten them both, and now their blood is mixed inside the flea, which is indicating
that they've already had sex. 
Throughout the poem, we connected the life of John Donne to the poem and what led him to
write this poem. 
As the woman goes to kill the flea, the poet protests:

"Oh stay, three lives in one flea spare,

Where we almost, nay more than married are.
This flea is you and I, and this
Our marriage bed, and marriage temple is;
Though parents grudge, and you, w'are met,
And cloistered in these living walls of jet."

The woman doesn't listen to the man's request not to kill the flea, and kills it beneath her
fingernail. She feels no guilt over ending the flea's life, any more than the flea felt shame in
sucking blood from her body.