Sonnet 73 Figurative Language

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Sonnet 73 communicates the topic of the passing of time and the state of old age. The poem concentrates on the storyteller's own particular tension over developing old. There are three quatrains in this sonnet and each takes up the subject uniquely, looking at the storyteller's "time of year" with different cases of the progression of time in nature. Each quatrain builds upon the themes of the last. In the first quatrain, the storyteller analyzes himself to the late autumn time season, he compares the poet’s emotions to autumn. As we know, autumn is the season when the trees start to lose their leaves and the weather starts to get cold. Line 3 states “Upon those boughs which shake against the cold.” The speaker is comparing himself to a tree. The “boughs" are branches of trees, which is similar to limbs of a body. The cold weather can refer to death or sickness. Lastly, there is a pun within this quantrain. A "bough" is also similar to a “spear," because it is a long weapon. Therefore, a ”bough" that "shake[s]" is like a "spear" that "shake[s]," making this a reference to our main character. Continuing on, Quatrain two speeds things up a bit. It goes from the seasons of the year to the hours of the day. The storyteller is at the “twilight”…show more content…
Regardless, the storyteller is obviously upset by growing old. The narrator says that his mate will love him more, the older her gets, because his physical aging will remind him that he will die soon. But there is a turning point in the rhyming couplet that challenges this interpretation, indicating that love can be strengthened by the knowledge that life on earth is fleeting; that love becomes all the more special because of life’s transience. “To love that well which thou must leave ere long” Shakespeare neatly ties the themes of love and death together into a single complex
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