Analysis of Sonnet 128: How oft, when thou, my music, music play'st
William Shakespeare 1564 (Stratford-upon-Avon) – 1616 (Stratford-upon-Avon)
How oft, when thou, my music, music play'st,
Upon that blessèd wood whose motion sounds
With thy sweet fingers when thou gently sway'st
The wiry concord that mine ear confounds,
Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap
To kiss the tender inward of thy hand,
Whilst my poor lips, which should that harvest reap,
At the wood's boldness by thee blushing stand!
To be so tickled, they would change their state
And situation with those dancing chips
O'er whom thy fingers walk with gentle gait,
Making dead wood more blest than living lips.
Since saucy jacks so happy are in this,
Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kiss.
Scheme | ABABCDCDEFEFGG |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Shakespearean sonnet |
Metre | 11111101011 0111111101 11110111011 010111101 1110111101 1101010111 1111111101 1011011101 1111011111 001011101 10111011101 1011111101 1101110101 1111011111 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 621 |
Words | 113 |
Sentences | 4 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 14 |
Lines Amount | 14 |
Letters per line (avg) | 35 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 487 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 111 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 35 sec read
- 89 Views
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"Sonnet 128: How oft, when thou, my music, music play'st" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/41426/sonnet-128%3A-how-oft%2C-when-thou%2C-my-music%2C-music-play%27st>.
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