Sonnet CXLVII
My love is as a fever longing still,For that which longer nurseth the disease;Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill,The uncertain sickly appetite to please.My reason, the physician to my love,Angry that his prescriptions are not kept,Hath left me, and I desperate now approveDesire is death, which physic did except.Past cure I am, now Reason is past care,And frantic-mad with evermore unrest;My thoughts and my discourse as madmen’s are,At random from the truth vainly express’d;For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright,Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.
Words in this poem
- angry a.
- Troublesome; vexatious; rigorous. [See Anger.]
- desperate a.
- Without hope; given to despair; hopeless. [L. desperatus, p. p. of desperare. See Despair, and cf. Desperado.]
- evermore adv.
- During eternity; always; forever; for an indefinite period; at all times; -- often used substantively with for.
- unrest n.
- Want of rest or repose; unquietness; sleeplessness; uneasiness; disquietude.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sonnet CXLVII is in the public domain. This text is taken from Shakespeare's Sonnets, Project Gutenberg ebook #1041; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: William Shakespeare, Sonnet CXLVII, in The Sonnets (1609), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1041, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/shakespeare-sonnets/sonnet-147.html, id L00165.
Form and metre
Sonnet CXLVII is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABABCDCDEFEFGG, the pattern of the English sonnet. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 88% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.1 syllables. 7% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other English sonnets, other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABABCDCDEFEFGG stillA · diseaseB · illA · pleaseB · loveC · keptD · approveC · exceptD · careE · unrestF · areE · express'dF · brightG · nightG
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| My love is as a fever longing still, | 10 | ·····/˘/˘· |
| For that which longer nurseth the disease; | 10 | ···/˘/˘·˘/ |
| Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill, | 10 | /˘····˘/·· |
| The uncertain sickly appetite to please. | 11 | ·˘/˘/˘/˘··· |
| My reason, the physician to my love, | 10 | ·/˘·˘/˘··· |
| Angry that his prescriptions are not kept, | 10 | /˘··˘/˘··· |
| Hath left me, and I desperate now approve | 10 | ·····/˘·˘/ |
| Desire is death, which physic did except. | 10 | ˘/···/˘··· |
| Past cure I am, now Reason is past care, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| And frantic-mad with evermore unrest; | 10 | ·/˘··/˘·˘/ |
| My thoughts and my discourse as madmen’s are, | 10 | ····/˘·/˘· |
| At random from the truth vainly express’d; | 10 | ·/˘···/˘˘/ |
| For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright, | 10 | ·········· |
| Who art as black as hell, as dark as night. | 10 | ·········· |
On this poem
Notes from the edition 6
Notes by William J. Rolfe, Shakespeare's Sonnets (New York, 1905), Internet Archive scan
- Line 5 My reason, the physician, etc. Malone compares M. W. ii. 1. 5 : "though Love use Reason for his physician," etc.
- Line 7 Approve. Find by experience (that). Cf. Oth. ii. 3. 317 : " I have well approved it," etc.
- Line 8 Except. Object to, refuse. Palgrave explains thus : " I now discover that desire which reason rejected is death ; " but Dowden, better, " desire which did object to physic." Physic did except repeats the idea in prescriptions not kept, not that in reason . . . hath left me, as Palgrave seems to suppose.
- Line 9 Past cure, etc. Cf. L. L. I., v. 2. 28 : "past cure is still past care." It was a proverbial saying Malone quotes Holland's Leaguer, a pamphlet published in 1632 : '• She has got the adage in her mouth ; Things past cure, past care."
- Line 10 Evermore unrest. Walker compares Coleridge, Remorse, v. I : — " hopelessly deform'd By sights of evermore deformity." Sidney {Arcadia, book v.) has " the time of my ever farewell ap- proacheth."
- Line 14 As black as hell. Cf. 131. 1 2- 1 4 and 144. 4.
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