# Sonnet CXLVII explained — Poetry

> Chapter companion for Poetry by William Shakespeare.

## What happens

The speaker compares his love to a fever, describing how his reason has abandoned him and left him in a state of desperate madness, acknowledging that the object of his desire is as black as hell and dark as night.

## Themes in this chapter

### Lust and Morality

The speaker's love is depicted as a feverish disease that defies reason and leads to moral and physical decay.

### Truth and Deception

The speaker admits he has sworn the beloved fair and bright, but now sees her as black as hell, revealing self-deception and the gap between appearance and reality.

## Character check-ins

### William Shakespeare

The speaker of the sonnet, expressing his feverish and irrational love.

### Love

Personified as a fever that consumes the speaker.

### Death

Referenced as the outcome of desire, which reason had previously forbidden.

## Key lines

> 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 love is like a fever that constantly craves what makes it worse, sustaining the sickness to satisfy a restless, unhealthy desire.

_The speaker compares his love to an illness that feeds on itself._

> My reason, the physician to my love, Angry that his prescriptions are not kept, Hath left me, and I desperate now approve Desire is death, which physic did except.

My reason, which should cure my love, has abandoned me in anger because I ignored its advice, and now in desperation I accept that desire leads to death—something medicine once forbade.

_Reason is personified as a doctor who has given up on the speaker._

> For I have sworn thee fair and thought thee bright, Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.

Because I have sworn you were beautiful and thought you were radiant, when in truth you are as black as hell and as dark as night.

_The speaker admits his previous praise was false, revealing the beloved's true nature._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_28_se/chapters/cxlvii
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_28_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_28_se/chapters