Sonnet 85 on Saturday

In several ways, this is a harder weekend than even the next one. 

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LXXXV

  My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still,

  While comments of your praise richly compil'd,

  Reserve their character with golden quill,

  And precious phrase by all the Muses fil'd.

  I think good thoughts, whilst others write good words,

  And like unlettered clerk still cry 'Amen'

  To every hymn that able spirit affords,

  In polish'd form of well-refined pen.

  Hearing you praised, I say ''tis so, 'tis true,'

  And to the most of praise add something more;

  But that is in my thought, whose love to you,

  Though words come hindmost, holds his rank before.

    Then others, for the breath of words respect,

    Me for my dumb thoughts, speaking in effect.

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The while at the beginning of line 2, the whilst in line 5, the but at the beginning of line 11 (this one is, I think, a climax that’s been building through the previous two turns), and the then at the beginning of the closing couplet (this one adrresses the question “so what?”).  More tomorrow.

#84

Blogging before I drive to Ann Arbor to pick up my daughter for the weekend:

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LXXXIV

  Who is it that says most, which can say more,

  Than this rich praise,--that you alone, are you?

  In whose confine immured is the store

  Which should example where your equal grew.

  Lean penury within that pen doth dwell

  That to his subject lends not some small glory;

  But he that writes of you, if he can tell

  That you are you, so dignifies his story,

  Let him but copy what in you is writ,

  Not making worse what nature made so clear,

  And such a counterpart shall fame his wit,

  Making his style admired every where.

    You to your beauteous blessings add a curse,

    Being fond on praise, which makes your praises worse.

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I’m going with the comma at the end of the penultimate line …  More tomorrow.

Blogging before evening class

Sinking fast, but still alive.  Sonnet 83:

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LXXXIII

  I never saw that you did painting need,

  And therefore to your fair no painting set;

  I found, or thought I found, you did exceed

  That barren tender of a poet's debt:

  And therefore have I slept in your report,

  That you yourself, being extant, well might show

  How far a modern quill doth come too short,

  Speaking of worth, what worth in you doth grow.

  This silence for my sin you did impute,

  Which shall be most my glory being dumb;

  For I impair not beauty being mute,

  When others would give life, and bring a tomb.

    There lives more life in one of your fair eyes

    Than both your poets can in praise devise.

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The volta’s the when at the beginning of line 12.  Now I’ll go write the paper that’s due in this evening’s class  L  But before that, here’s another sonnet I needed to share today:

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Chain Poem

By Bob McKenty

You mustn’t throw away this faded verse.

Make 20 copies. Send to 20 friends.

If you ignore this warning, then a curse

Will fall on you. Your hair will get split ends.

You’ll shortly lose the mates to all your socks

And dandelions will desecrate your yard.

Your firstborn will contract the chicken pox,

The cash machine consume your debit card.

Voracious termites will attack your house.

Your septic tank will start to overflow.

You’ll turn the TV on and find your spouse

Appearing on the Jerry Springer Show.

Then, just when things have started looking better,

You’ll get another copy of this letter.

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You have been warned, so send this sonnet to 20 of your friends, and do it RIGHT NOW!!  And the volta in this one would be the then at the beginning of the closing couplet.  More tomorrow.

Volta project, part 82

Only halfway through the week, and I’m approximately wishing I were dead instead of having all of these papers due  :(  But here’s today’s sonnet:

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LXXXII

  I grant thou wert not married to my Muse,

  And therefore mayst without attaint o'erlook

  The dedicated words which writers use

  Of their fair subject, blessing every book.

  Thou art as fair in knowledge as in hue,

  Finding thy worth a limit past my praise;

  And therefore art enforced to seek anew

  Some fresher stamp of the time-bettering days.

  And do so, love; yet when they have devis'd,

  What strained touches rhetoric can lend,

  Thou truly fair, wert truly sympathiz'd

  In true plain words, by thy true-telling friend;

    And their gross painting might be better us'd

    Where cheeks need blood; in thee it is abus'd.

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The volta’s obvious:  It’s the yet in line 9.  Shakespeare’s getting a little mad, I think, both at the rival poet and at the (mutual) subject  J  More tomorrow—

Even the sonnet's about death

Sonnet 81 on this difficult day:

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LXXXI

  Or I shall live your epitaph to make,

  Or you survive when I in earth am rotten;

  From hence your memory death cannot take,

  Although in me each part will be forgotten.

  Your name from hence immortal life shall have,

  Though I, once gone, to all the world must die:

  The earth can yield me but a common grave,

  When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie.

  Your monument shall be my gentle verse,

  Which eyes not yet created shall o'er-read;

  And tongues to be, your being shall rehearse,

  When all the breathers of this world are dead;

    You still shall live,--such virtue hath my pen,--

    Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.

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The main volta would be the such in the penultimate line (but there are several minor turns all over the poem) (which I have no time to list in detail today).  More tomorrow— 

The hard part of life

This is going to be a bad week  :(  Seven things due in the next four days:  Two tomorrow, three on Thursday, two more on Friday.  But for now, sonnet 80:

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LXXX

  O! how I faint when I of you do write,

  Knowing a better spirit doth use your name,

  And in the praise thereof spends all his might,

  To make me tongue-tied speaking of your fame!

  But since your worth--wide as the ocean is,--

  The humble as the proudest sail doth bear,

  My saucy bark, inferior far to his,

  On your broad main doth wilfully appear.

  Your shallowest help will hold me up afloat,

  Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride;

  Or, being wrack'd, I am a worthless boat,

  He of tall building, and of goodly pride:

    Then if he thrive and I be cast away,

    The worst was this,--my love was my decay.

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List of turns big and small that I am seeing here: the comma at the end of line 1, the comma at the end of line 3, the but at the ebginning fo line 5, the doth in line 8, the comma at the end of line 9, the or at the beginning of line 11, the comma at the end of the same line … the comma in the last line would be the main volta.  The as in line 6 has a delightful plurity of meaning  :)  Another sonnet tomorrow—

End of break :(

Blogging before driving my daughter back to Ann Arbor:

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LXXIX

  Whilst I alone did call upon thy aid,

  My verse alone had all thy gentle grace;

  But now my gracious numbers are decay'd,

  And my sick Muse doth give an other place.

  I grant, sweet love, thy lovely argument

  Deserves the travail of a worthier pen;

  Yet what of thee thy poet doth invent

  He robs thee of, and pays it thee again.

  He lends thee virtue, and he stole that word

  From thy behaviour; beauty doth he give,

  And found it in thy cheek: he can afford

  No praise to thee, but what in thee doth live.

    Then thank him not for that which he doth say,

    Since what he owes thee, thou thyself dost pay.

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One of the more complex sonnets  J  Full of turns: the whilst at the very beginning means the comma at the end of that phrase is a turn; the but at the beginning of line 3; the yet at the beginning of line 7; the and in in line 9; the and at the beginning of line 11; the then at the beginning of the closing couplet; the since at the beginning of the last line.  In a sonnet with this many turns, Shakespeare shows some lovely special effects for ornamentation: the mesodiplosis of alone in the first two lines to mark the opening, for example, and the more complex parallel construction in lines 9–11.  More tomorrow—