How heavy do I journey on the way,
When what I seek—my weary travels end—
Doth teach that ease and that repose to say,
‘Thus far the miles are measured from thy friend!’
Yes folks, we’ve got a sonnet today. And since it’s only
fourteen lines (you knew that, right?), let’s see what the whole thing looks
like.
How heavy do I journey on the way,
When what I seek, my weary travel's end,
Doth teach that ease and that repose to say
'Thus far the miles are measured from thy friend!'
The beast that bears me, tired with my woe,
Plods dully on, to bear that weight in me,
As if by some instinct the wretch did know
His rider loved not speed, being made from thee:
The bloody spur cannot provoke him on
That sometimes anger thrusts into his hide;
Which heavily he answers with a groan,
More sharp to me than spurring to his side;
For that same groan doth put this in my mind;
My grief lies onward and my joy behind.
When what I seek, my weary travel's end,
Doth teach that ease and that repose to say
'Thus far the miles are measured from thy friend!'
The beast that bears me, tired with my woe,
Plods dully on, to bear that weight in me,
As if by some instinct the wretch did know
His rider loved not speed, being made from thee:
The bloody spur cannot provoke him on
That sometimes anger thrusts into his hide;
Which heavily he answers with a groan,
More sharp to me than spurring to his side;
For that same groan doth put this in my mind;
My grief lies onward and my joy behind.
That’s not so bad, is it? In fact, this one’s pretty
straight forward. But just in case, I’m going to pull out my sonnet book to see
what it says. No wait, let’s take a shot at having a few words about it first.
Um, he’s saying that he doesn’t like traveling away from his
love. Duh. Okay, now let’s see what the book says.
‘The
speaker goes miserably on a journey which takes him away from the young man,
and his slow horse seems to sympathize with his reluctance. The sonnet may
allude ironically to Sidney, AS, 49, in which Astrophil rides his horse and is
in turn ridden by love.’
That’s from The Arden Shakespeare, Shakespeare’s
Sonnets, edited by Katherine Duncan-Jones.
Okay, I like my explanation better. It’s much simpler. And
simpler is usually a good thing. I think Will would agree with that sentiment. No, really. I do.
Now I was thinking of going another direction with this post. It has to do with a Robert Frost poem. I'll bet you can guess what I'm thinking of. But I'm kind of beat, so I'm going to end it here.
This is my friend taking horse riding lessons last summer. I don't feel very inspired about this picture, but it's the only one I could find that has a horse in it, so I'm going to go with it.
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