Shakespeare Sonnet #23
...icts some wild creature or force who seems to be overflowing with wrath. The excess of wrath within this creature gives it an abundance of strength; however, this abundance only helps to weaken the creature’s determination. The rage within the creature can be directly connected to the beginning of the quatrain by describing it as the passion within the actor. Therefore the creature at the end of the first quatrain is assumed to be the actor as well, hence both being the same person with the internal qualm. In the second quatrain the sense of fear emerges once again, “So I, for fear of trust, forget to say” (line 5). This part of the second quatrain can be taken as Shakespeare expressing how he is afraid to trust himself. The distraction mentioned in the first quatrain can be blamed easily on and is associated with his fear of trust, whether it may be the fear to trust himself, or an unexplainable fear he has in letting someone else down. Then all of a sudden, as a way to put this fear of trust to rest, Shakespeare makes a change of scene by writing, “The perfect ceremony of love’s rite” (line 6). This line hints at a possible marriage ceremony or a type of wedding vow. It is used possibly as a way of extinguishing all the insecurities within him when it comes to trusting the one he loves, or letting someone else feel as if he is trustworthy. Marriage is an eternal bond between two people, and a covenant of trust with someone else is a way of making two people feel as if they are one. As the second quatrain continues, the creature depicted at the beginning resurrects: “And in mine own love’s strength seem to decay/ O’ercharged with burden of mine own love’s might” (line 7, 8). Shakespeare’s mental uproar continues as he describes his own love’s might as slowly drifting from within the confines of his heart. He seems to be significantly overwhelmed by this. The person’s “strength” seems “to decay” due to his love eating away at him from inside. He seems to be “o’ercharged” with a feeling of helplessness and agony; helplessness due to the fact that he can’t seem to find the way to express his love to his counterpart, and agony because this feeling is slowly killing him from within. After the first two quatrains, which actually form an octet, Shakespeare changes his view on the whole situation. He shows this by writing “Oh let my books be then the eloquence” (line 9). As if this were the only way his feelings were able to come out, Shakespeare hopes his sonnets will be expressive enough to convey his love. To Shakespeare, writing is the only method he seems to have in order to cope with what he feels inside. He struggles within to find the exact words, worthy enough to express how he feels. Nevertheless, his message is slightly conveyed in a very silent manner. This message will be carried out by his “speaking breast.” “And dumb presagers of my speaking breast” (line 10) will foretell silently what his heart could say if it only spoke. Although the person wishes his heart would be able to express his feelings, he is physically tongue tied. He is speechless when it comes to conveying his love, therefore only having one thing to resort to, a wish of one day being able to speak from his heart. As a reference to a dumb presager, Shakespeare continues the final quatrain with “Who plead for love, and look for recompense” (line 11). Shakespeare pleads with his heart to express how he feels. Furthermore, when referring to “recompense,” he states that all his heart is asking for is love in return. He f...