Sonnet 43

“Sonnet 27” by William Shakespeare (1609)

This sonnet is addressed to The Fair Youth, and, like “Sonnet 43,” deals with nighttime, dreams, and longing. Here, the speaker, “weary with toil” (Line 1), retreats to bed in hopes of rest. However, they cannot turn off their thoughts and makes a “zealous pilgrimage to thee” (Line 6). Like in the later “Sonnet 43,” the beloved appears in the speaker’s imagination, “like a jewel hung in ghastly night, / [which makes] black night beauteous” (Lines 11-12). However, this is not particularly comforting, because “by day my limbs, by night my mind, / For thee and for myself no quiet find” (Lines 13-14). The vision doesn’t offer peace to the speaker and, like “Sonnet 43,” the imagined beauty of the beloved is agitated in its absence.

“Sonnet 61” by William Shakespeare (1609)

Like “Sonnet 27” and “Sonnet 43,” “Sonnet 61,” which also appeared in Shakespeare’s Sonnets, centers on the speaker’s insomnia caused by the beloved. Here, the images of the beloved “mock my sight” (Line 4). The speaker hopefully wonders if The Fair Youth sends his image “into my deeds to pry” (Line 6) because he is jealous. However, the speaker realizes they are deluding themselves, as the beloved’s “love, though much, is not so great” (Line 9). Their relationship feels one-sided as they “play the watchman ever for thy sake” (Line 12). The beloved enjoys the company of others and “dost wake elsewhere” (Line 13), both physically and emotionally distant, “far from home” (Line 6). As the sonnets progress, the speaker is beginning to realize their obsession with the beloved is unhealthy.

“Sonnet 87” by William Shakespeare (1609)

In “Sonnet 87,” the speaker attempts to distance themselves from the beloved, noting that the relationship is too “dear” (Line 1)—meaning expensive—“for my possessing” (Line 1). The speaker recognizes their relationship with The Fair Youth as lacking substance—“for that riches where is my deserving” (Line 6)—and being one-sided—“[f]or how do I hold thee but by thy granting” (Line 5). The speaker admits that their love is fiction, claiming “I had thee as a dream” (Line 13) and using dream imagery to indicate its imaginary nature, similar to “Sonnet 27,” “Sonnet 43,” and “Sonnet 61.” Here, however, there is a shift to admitting there is no escape in dreaming as the speaker finally notes: “In sleep a king, but waking no such matter” (Line 14). The poem helps solidify the speaker’s eventual movement away from the beloved, and serves as a “farewell” (Line 1).