English Poetry
Matric 2023 IEB
Reece Williamson
, To me fair friend, you never can be old
Sonnet 104 “10 syllables per line”
NB - Poem is all 1 stanza
Fair friend - beautiful
The speaker addresses the fair youth to whom this
1
poem and many others are dedicated to
To me, fair friend, you never can be old,
2
For as you were when first your eye I eyed,
3
He is thinking specifically about the young man’s
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold eyes.
4
Have from the forests shook three summers’ pride, He tells this young man that despite the time that
might’ve passed since they met that he looks no
Since the first time they met, three “cold” winters have passed older. He cannot, in the speaker’s eyes, ever age.
and three prideful summers. The Fair Youth is just as beautiful as he was when
they first knew one another.
5
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turned
6 They have been together through three Aprils,
In process of the seasons have I seen, which smelled of blooming flowers, and “three
7 hot Junes” that burned under the summer sun.
Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burned, The first time he saw this young man he was
8 “fresh” and he still appears that way.
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green.
This quatrain adds that their time together has also seen The word “green” in this line
“Three beauteous springs” that became “yellow autumn[s]”. refers to youth as if a fruit has
not quite ripened.
9
Ah, yet doth beauty, like a dial-hand, Time moves slowly, so much so that people
cannot see it. It is “like a dial-hand” of a
10
Steal from his figure, and no pace perceived; clock. This simile speaks to the power time
has and how “no pace” can be perceived.
11
So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand,
12
His “sweet hue” which appears to stand still is actually moving.
Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceived:
It “Hath motion” and the speaker’s eye is deceived.
13
For fear of which, hear this, thou age unbred:
14
He knows that the young man’s
Ere you were born was beauty’s summer dead. beauty is also changing.
In the last quatrain of ‘To me, fair friend, you never can be old’
the speaker changes tactics slightly and acknowledges that In the couplet, which comes after the turn in the poem,
although the young man may seem not to have aged, the he thinks about the possibility that his eyes have been
speaker knows that he has. deceived. He addresses “thou age unbred,” or the future
generations. The speaker tells them that no matter
what they see around them, the most beautiful person
to have lived is now dead.
Made by Reece Williamson, distribution of this document is illegal
