Reflection for Sonnet 129

The theme of this sonnet appears to be lust. The speaker might be ranting in this sonnet about his long time feelings for this woman creating frustration over not having her. This might be the reason why the majority of the sonnet is negative rather than positive. Perhaps love is driving him crazy, so he wrote the poem to take out some of his frustration, but it ended up just driving him crazy all over again because he thought about it more. This sonnet might also be him wondering "why did I do that?" or "how did that happen?" These could be his thoughts before, during, and after his actions regarding the lust he felt since he used all three tenses of verbs in line ten of the sonnet.
This sonnet could be speaking about the vicious cycle that is lust. How it is difficult for humans to resist it, but it is not very good at the same time. In the end the speaker starts talking about lust like it was a good thing, and that he would do it again. Then in the last line of the couplet, the speaker says it is heaven and hell at the same time.

Reflection for Sonnet 130

At first glance, this sonnet appears to be rather insulting to the person it is directed at. The speaker is going on about how his mistress is unattractive. The sun is not like her eyes, her lips are not red, her skin is dark, her hair is wiry, her cheeks are not rosy, and her breath smells bad. However, in the couplet he says that he still loves her and that he believes his love is rare.
This sonnet might not actually be as insulting as it seems. The speaker could be trying to say that love is more than skin deep. He does not need her to have traditional good looks for him to love her. He could also be saying that his woman is not traditionally good looking, but has beauty that is all her own. Shakespeare could also have written this sonnet to mock most Italian sonnets, which usually compare someone to the sun and roses and other things of that sort.

Reflection for Sonnet 99

The structure of this sonnet is very unique. Instead of fourteen lines, this sonnet has fifteen lines. Some people argue over whether or not it qualifies as a sonnet then, but the first line is technically an "introductory line," so it can still count as a sonnet. In the poem, the speaker appears to be yelling at the flowers for stealing. The flowers' beauty is said to have come from the young man. Since when things are stolen they are gone, I wonder if the young man's looks had begun to fade, and the speaker is blaming the flowers for making his beauty disappear.
There are two roses, a red one and a white one. The color red stands for shame and the color white stands for despair. In the last line of the third quatrain, the speaker is saying that death will be their punishment for stealing. The worms will eat the roses' shame and despair.
This sonnet might also represent Shakespeare's uncertainty about the dark lady. He might be wondering if he actually likes her more, or if it is just the young man he sees in her that he likes so much.

Reflection for Sonnet 73

This sonnet's theme is aging. The second line references autumn, whose parallel is the decline in life after one's prime. Ruined choirs could mean how the choirs deteriorated quickly after Henry VIII died, which is another way to talk about life's ending. In the first line of the second quatrain, the speaker talks about himself. He says that he is in the twilight of day, which means that he is getting old. Then he talks about the sunset fading and that the black night takes away. I think that he is saying that he's going to die soon. Death's second self could mean sleep, which is seen as a living death.
The third quatrain seems to be one metaphor. Inside the speaker there is a fire, and that fire is dying. The fire must die soon; its downfall is that it is being nourished by what it needs to live.
The couplet is telling the person to which the poem is directed to that he needs to appreciate his youth before it fades like the speaker's has. The last line could be telling the young man that he needs to love that which will soon die, which could mean the speaker.

Reflection for Sonnet 116

Sonnet 116 could be interpreted in a few ways. Some people see it as Shakespeare trying to define what love is, but it could also be seen as a rebuttal to an argument with someone. In this sonnet, there are a lot of negatives. The speaker spends a lot of time saying what love is not, and only the second quatrain says what love is. The last line also has three negatives. "I never writ, nor no man ever loved." This sonnet is not very unique or special. Almost all of the words are monosyllabic, and very few are over two syllables.
In the second quatrain, the speaker compares love to a star. This can be seen as him saying that love is immortal, immeasurable, a guiding light, and unmovable.
The speaker also said that love is not Time's fool. This means that true love is not affected by time and will continue on even into death, which is also claimed in the last line of the third quatrain. It is said that beauty is affected by Time, so love is more than skin-deep.

Reflection for Sonnet 55

This sonnet is also about the boy being immortal. Many symbols in this poem are man-made. This could imply that mankind would want to try to immortalize the boy because he is that amazing. The speaker again says how this poem will help the boy become immortal and how the poem will survive longer than any statues will. Monuments crumble and words on them fade, but this writing will keep you alive. He may be trying to win the boy over again by saying that it is due to him that he is able to live forever. Shakespeare seems very confident in this poem. Shakespeare writes that his poetry is better than statues and shrines that other men have created. In the last line, the speaker says that the boy will always live in lovers' eyes. This is again flattering the boy, saying that he is one of the most beautiful things in the world. It is also again calling him immortal, although this time it is not Shakespeare making him immortal.

Reflection for Sonnet 18

Sonnet 18 is Shakespeare's most well known sonnet. The first line of the poem seems to be asking "should I really?", as though it is not good enough or somewhat ordinary. The first octave is all about how summer is not good enough, why it is plain. It fades quickly, it is too warm, it is not constant. This could be a reference to how ordinary people compare to the young man. Then he tells the young man how his looks will not fade with Time like summer's will. Death cannot say that he has the man. The speaker then says that it is because of the poems. As long as people read the lines, the man will not fade with Time. His poetry keeps the man from Death since his memory will not fade. The line could also mean family lineage, as long as the boy chooses to have children. This sonnet also ends in a comma. This could simply be a human mistake, or Shakespeare could have intended it to mean that the boy will keep going, like the poem seems to.

Reflection for Sonnet 12

The first line of this sonnet starts out describing the ticking of a clock. Shakespeare also wrote the line to include a lot of hard letters to imitate the actual ticking on a clock. In the second line, the speaker talks about the "brave day" and "hideous night", which likely symbolize life and death, respectively. The brave day is being sunk in the hideous night, and this means aging. The first eight lines talk about aging in nature. These lines also seem to go in a sort of chronological order through the seasons. The second line talks about a dying violet, the fourth line talks about a tree without leaves (like Fall), and the eighth line mentions a white and bristly beard similar to snow. Lines seven and eight talk about a wheelbarrow carrying items, but the word for wheelbarrow can also mean a corpse, so this could be a reference also to the man being carried away to his funeral. The last two lines tell how the only way to defend yourself against time is to have children, because then your physical traits will be carried on.

Reflection for Sonnet 2

This sonnet is somewhat carpe diem. The speaker is telling the young man that he is going to be old before he knows it, and that in his old age he might regret not having any children to carry on the line. The speaker is telling the young man to seize the day now while he can before he gets old and loses his beauty. He will have something to show for himself when he has nothing. The speaker makes a quick transition from saying "thy beauty" to calling the young man a "tottered weed" only two lines later. This may have been done to make it seem more dramatic, like how quickly his looks may fade once he becomes old. The last line may be a reference to how his child's blood will be warm when his is cold from death, and it could also mean that his blood line will be warm when he is dead.

Reflection for Sonnet 1

In the first sonnet, Shakespeare puts a lot of oxymoron's next to each other. He writes about making famine where abundance lies, to thy sweet self too cruel, and tender churl. All of these contradict each other. There should not be famine where there is abundance, sweet and cruel are opposites, as is a tender churl (where churl means miser). Shakespeare might be trying to show how the young man is so lovely and great, but it is horrible that he is not having children. He also states how the boy is making waste in hoarding. This probably references how he is hoarding his beauty by not continuing his genes in a child. Shakespeare is probably trying to flatter the young man in a way to convince him to listen to Shakespeare. He's being kind and flattering, then he negates it by saying something unkind, which might be a way to get the young man to pay attention.