# Sonnet XCIX explained — Poetry

> Chapter companion for Poetry by William Shakespeare.

## What happens

The speaker chides the violet, lily, marjoram, and roses for stealing their beauty and fragrance from the beloved, concluding that all flowers are thieves of the beloved's attributes.

## Themes in this chapter

### Beauty and Transience

Flowers are depicted as thieves of the beloved's beauty, yet their stolen beauty is subject to decay, as seen in the canker eating the rose.

### Truth and Deception

The flowers are accused of theft, blurring the line between natural beauty and borrowed, deceptive appearance.

## Character check-ins

### Youth

The beloved whose breath, complexion, veins, hand, and hair are the source of all floral beauty.

## Key lines

> The forward violet thus did I chide: Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells, If not from my love’s breath?

I scolded the early violet, calling it a sweet thief and asking where it got its fragrance if not from my beloved's breath.

_The speaker accuses the violet of stealing its scent from the beloved._

> The roses fearfully on thorns did stand, One blushing shame, another white despair; A third, nor red nor white, had stol’n of both And to his robbery had annex’d thy breath; But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth A vengeful canker eat him up to death.

The roses stood on their thorns in fear: one blushed with shame, another turned white with despair, and a third, neither red nor white, stole from both and added your breath to its theft, but as punishment a destructive worm ate it to death.

_The roses are personified and punished for stealing the beloved's attributes._

## Links

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