Sonnet 23: as an Unperfect Actor on the Stage
Sonnet 23: as an Unperfect Actor on the Stage - form Summary
A Sonnet of Shy Speech
This poem is a Shakespearean sonnet that uses the familiar three quatrains and a closing couplet to dramatize a speaker’s inability to express love verbally. The quatrains present metaphors of an imperfect actor and overpowering feeling that silence the tongue. The final couplet turns to an epigrammatic plea: the beloved should "read" the speaker’s silent signs. The sonnet’s structure stages the problem and delivers a compact, persuasive resolution.
Read Complete AnalysesAs an unperfect actor on the stage Who with his fear is put beside his part, Or some fierce thing replete with too much rage, Whose strength’s abundance weakens his own heart, So I, for fear of trust, forget to say The perfect ceremony of love’s rite, And in mine own love’s strength seem to decay, O’ercharged with burden of mine own love’s might. O, let my books be then the eloquence And dumb presagers of my speaking breast, Who plead for love, and look for recompense More than that tongue that more hath more expressed. O, learn to read what silent love hath writ, To hear with eyes belongs to love’s fine wit.
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