Analysis of Sonnet 64: When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced
William Shakespeare 1564 (Stratford-upon-Avon) – 1616 (Stratford-upon-Avon)
When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced
The rich-proud cost of outworn buried age;
When sometime lofty towers I see down-razed
And brass eternal slave to mortal rage;
When I have seen the hungry ocean gain
Advantage on the kingdom of the shore,
And the firm soil win of the watery main,
Increasing store with loss, and loss with store;
When I have seen such interchange of state,
Or state it self confounded to decay,
Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate
That Time will come and take my love away.
This thought is as a death which cannot choose
But weep to have that which it fears to lose.
Scheme | ABCBDEDEFGFGHH |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111111101 011111101 1110101111 0101011101 1111010101 0101010101 00111101001 0101110111 111110111 1111010101 101111110 1111011101 1111011101 1111111111 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 598 |
Words | 114 |
Sentences | 3 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 14 |
Lines Amount | 14 |
Letters per line (avg) | 34 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 471 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 112 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 34 sec read
- 96 Views
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"Sonnet 64: When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 8 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/41516/sonnet-64%3A-when-i-have-seen-by-time%27s-fell-hand-defaced>.
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