Analysis of Sonnet 83: Good, Brother Philip

Sir Philip Sidney 1554 (Penshurst, Kent) – 1586 (Zutphen)



Good, brother Philip, I have borne you long.
I was content you should in favor creep,
While craftily you seem'd your cut to keep,
As though that fair soft hand did you great wrong.

I bare (with envy) yet I bare your song,
When in her neck you did love ditties peep;
Nay, more fool I, oft suffer'd you to sleep
In lilies' nest, where Love's self lies along.

What, doth high place ambitious thoughts augment?
Is sauciness reward of courtesy?
Cannot such grace your silly self content,

But you must needs with those lips billing be?
And through those lips drink nectar from that tongue?
Leave that, Sir Phip, lest off your neck be wrung.


Scheme ABBA ABBA CDC DEE
Poetic Form
Metre 1101011111 1110110101 11111111 1111111111 1111011111 1001111101 1111110111 0101111101 1111010101 11011100 1011110110 1111111101 0111110111 1111111111
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 642
Words 118
Sentences 9
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 3, 3
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 35
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 123
Words per stanza (avg) 29
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

36 sec read
37

Sir Philip Sidney

Sir Philip Sidney was an English poet, courtier, scholar and soldier who is remembered as one of the most prominent figures of the Elizabethan age. more…

All Sir Philip Sidney poems | Sir Philip Sidney Books

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